"AY, BUT HOW CAME YE ABOARD, MY LAD?"

"Ay, but how came ye aboard, my lad?" Jacob was asking, looking into the boy's tearful face.

"In a boat, so please you, sir," replied the boy. "In the same boat with yourself, Master Hartop."

"Nay, but I saw you not," returned Jacob. "I saw you not, else, be assured, I'd have sent you back instanter to your mother. What think you the poor soul will do when she findeth you have not come home?"

"I had but one thought," said the lad, looking up, "and that was to get on board the Revenge with Master Gilbert Oglander."

It was at this moment that Gilbert entered the crowd and heard his name spoken. He glanced at the boy.

"Body o' me!" he cried. "Why, 'tis young Robin Redfern of Modbury village! How comes he here?"

"Ay, 'tis Robin himself, truly," said Jacob Hartop, turning at hearing Gilbert's voice. "He hath a mind to fight for the Queen, he says, so smuggled himself aboard. Master Roland Grenville found him stowed away below, and hath now gone to inform Sir Richard. I saw the child myself on Sutton quay, ay, and spake with him, but I'd no notion that he meant to follow us on board. 'Tis foolish in him, as I have told him, for a lad so young is but an encumbrance on a ship of battle."

"Nay, but I mean to work," protested Robin. "I'll work hard. Sure there be many things I can do, Master Hartop." And then as he saw Sir Richard Grenville emerging from one of the doors at the farther end of the deck he began to cry very piteously, as though fearing that he must surely be severely punished.

"What have we here?" demanded Sir Richard.

"So please your honour, 'tis a boy," explained one of the men.

"Ay, I can well see 'tis not a horse," said the admiral; and then plying the boy with many questions, and learning that he was from Modbury, he turned to Gilbert Oglander: "Take him into your personal charge, Master Oglander," said he. "Let him be your serving-boy, or a powder-boy, or what you like; and bid the purser enter him on the ship's books. As for his mother, 'tis a pity for her that most concerns me, and I would have you inscribe a letter to her, and throw it overboard in a bottle, which may haply be picked up by some passing fishing-boat." And with that he strolled back aft towards his cabin, where he remained secluded until late on the following morning.

Now as Gilbert passed again along the deck he looked over to the land, as he had done many times already, in the hope of being able to make out the towers of Modbury Manor in the far distance. Many a time had he stood in the upper room of one of those towers to watch the ships sailing outward from Plymouth Sound, and now for the first time he hoped to reverse the process and try to discover his home from the ship's deck. It was no very easy matter, in the fading light of the evening, to identify any house so far away; but Modbury stood upon a height and was prominent enough if one knew exactly where to look for it. At last, however, he descried the topmost tower above the trees; he could even see the tall flag-staff, with the flag fluttering in the breeze. He kept his eyes fixed upon the flag for many moments, believing that it had been hoisted for his own benefit as a signal of farewell. But at last he began to realize that for some strange reason it had not been drawn fully up to the top of the staff—that indeed it had been hoisted half-mast high. And this, as he well knew, was a token of death. A pang of alarm shot through him; he felt suddenly very desolate and lonely. Again and again he turned his eyes upon the flag, hoping that he had made a mistake. As he stood there Roland Grenville passed near him.

"What, art home-sick so soon?" said he with a light laugh.

Gilbert was silent for a moment, and at length, pointing to the land, he said:

"Look to the flag on Modbury tower yonder. I beg you look at it and tell me if my sight deceiveth me. Is't not flying at the half-mast?"

"Ay, in very sooth, 'tis so," returned young Grenville. "I can see it plainly. Someone is surely dead—Ah, the trees hide it now!"

"Heaven send 'tis not my grandfather!" cried Gilbert. "I cannot believe 'tis he, for I left him hale and well. And yet I can think of none else."

"Mayhap 'tis your uncle Jasper," suggested Roland.

But Gilbert shook his head, remembering Jasper's vigorous strength.

"No," he said; "it cannot be uncle Jasper."

"Then 'tis your cousin Philip, I warrant me," said Grenville. "The lad hath met with some mishap on the hare-brained journey that you told me of. Said you not that he went off on horseback, and that you had not heard news of him for two full days? 'Tis clearly he."

And arguing with himself that night as he lay in the ship's cabin, sleepless and sick at heart, Gilbert came to the conclusion that this was so. He surmised that Philip had been thrown from his horse, or had come into some quarrel with highway vagabonds and had been brought home to Modbury dead. Little did he dream that Philip Oglander was now on board the Pearl on his way to Spain; little did he dream that his grandfather now lay dead in his great room at Modbury Manor; and as little did he dream that now at this same moment he was himself the only Baron Champernoun.

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CHAPTER XIV.

A CHAIN OF PENANCE.

THAT brief voyage from Plymouth to the islands of the Azores was in the main an uneventful one. Gilbert Oglander, who, notwithstanding his love of ships, had never before spent a night upon the sea, very speedily succumbed to the effects of the ship's motion. The Revenge rolled and pitched upon the great green waves that met her in the open channel beyond the Eddystone rocks, and when she was off Ushant a thick sea-mist hemmed her in, and she lay there tossing for many hours under close-reefed sails, beyond sight or hail of the other vessels of the fleet.

It was while the fog still held round her that Gilbert first ventured upon deck. Jacob Hartop met him there, and greeted him with a question.

"Prithee, Master Oglander," said the old man, "hast seen aught of young Robin Redfern these few hours past?"

"Nay," answered Gilbert, "he hath not been near me since I have been below."

"Then I much fear," returned Hartop, "that the lad hath fallen overboard, for no man hath set eyes upon him since we shortened sail eight hours ago. We have searched for him all-wheres, but he cannot be found. As a last resource I have sent a man up the main-mast to seek him in the tops, although 'tis well-nigh impossible he can be there."

As he spoke the old man glanced aloft through the fog, and at the same moment a voice hailed him from tops.

"Below there!" the voice cried. "The kid is here. I have found him!"

Jacob Hartop sprang up upon the bulwarks, grasped the shrouds, and climbed up with the nimbleness of a much younger man. Gilbert watched him, and presently he disappeared into the railed gallery there. When he again appeared he was slowly descending, bearing the boy's inert form over his shoulder.

"There!" cried Hartop, as he dumped the lad down upon the deck. "Thank the Lord y'are not starved to death up there!"

The boy looked up, dazed as if he had been suddenly aroused from sleep.

"How came you to go hiding up there?" questioned Hartop in a severe tone. "Dost know how you have alarmed us, quotha? How came you up there, I say?"

The lad's eyes glanced about him as if in mortal fear.

"'Twas Red Bob," he stammered. "He's here, on board this ship. I was afraid of him, Master Hartop; for he doth owe me a sorry grudge for being the cause of his being put into prison. I went up the mast to hide from him, and, being there, I could not get down again, try as I would."

"And, prithee, who might be this Red Bob of whom y'are so afraid?" asked Jacob.

And then Robin caught sight of Gilbert Oglander, and he said:

"Master Gilbert should know the man. 'Tis the man that was put into prison for stealing the ducks and geese from the Manor farm, Master Gilbert, and that attacked you in Beddington Dingle, and that robbed Master Hartop of his bag of precious stones that he had brought home from the Spanish Main."

"Marry!" exclaimed Gilbert in surprise. "And you say he is aboard the Revenge?"

"Ay, truly," said Robin; "and by the way he regarded me, I feel sure he doth know that it was I who raised the alarm and was the cause of his being caught."

"You need be in no such fear of the man, my lad," said Gilbert. "Let him but attempt to harm you, and I warrant you he'll not soon forget it. You are in my personal charge now, Robin, and I'll see you are hurt by no man."

Later on that same day Gilbert encountered the man Red Bob in the forward part of the ship, whence the lad had gone immediately after prayers to witness a strange ceremony, of which the occasion was this: that Red Bob had that day been taken in the swearing of a blasphemous oath, and was now to be punished in sight of his companions. With a general consent of all the ship's company, it had been ordained that any man guilty of using profane language should be condemned to wear a heavy iron chain about his neck, and that at the time of morning and evening prayers he should receive three blows given him by the boatswain. The guilty man could only free himself from the penalty by transferring it to another whom he discovered swearing. Thus did the men of the Revenge endeavour to banish the vice of bad language on board.

Red Bob had worn the chain for the space of seven hours, and he was standing in the midst of his fellows meekly submitting to the boatswain's blows when Gilbert appeared. Gilbert thought he had never seen a man whose face showed more of brutality and evil than this Red Bob, and as he looked at him and remembered that night in Beddington Dingle, he could not doubt that it was this same man, this poacher, who had attacked Jacob Hartop and stolen the poor old man's wallet with its jewels and the precious letter, of which so much had been said at Modbury Manor.

Jacob Hartop himself was at Gilbert's elbow as Red Bob retired towards the forecastle smarting from the boatswain's blows. As he approached them he touched his forelock, and was passing on when Gilbert accosted him.

"Stop," said the lad, "I have a word or two to say to you."

"I am at your worship's service," returned Red Bob. "What would you?" And then, recognizing Gilbert as the young heir of Modbury, he added: "But I have little need to ask, methinks, for I guess that you would question me concerning the matter of the night when I was arrested and thrown into Plymouth gaol?"

Gilbert nodded. "Yes," he said, "you have guessed my wish right truly."

"Well, your honour," said Red Bob, "as to the poaching of the farm ducks—"

"Nay, I meant not the poaching matter," interrupted Gilbert. "You have had your just punishment for that, and so 'tis at an end. It was rather of the matter of your attack upon Master Hartop here, that I would know more. You see, there was a letter stolen—a letter of grave importance."

"Ay, 'twas the Spaniards that purloined it," broke in Red Bob.

"The Spaniards?" echoed Gilbert. "Prithee, what Spaniards mean you?"

"Look you, my masters," said Red Bob, and then he drew Gilbert to the bulwarks and signed to Hartop to join him. "I can tell you, mayhap, more than you know. But firstly, be assured that I had no hand in the affair. The men who waylaid Master Hartop were Jasper Oglander, his son Philip, and one Andrea de Ortega. Nay, do not doubt me," he cautioned, seeing that Gilbert shook his head in incredulity; "I had the whole story from overhearing the Spaniards while I was in the gaol. For you must know that, having been for some three years on the Spanish galleys, I know their language, though of that they never dreamt when they contrived their plots and conspiracies in my hearing. Willingly would I have warned Master Richard Drake of their schemes; but in gaol one can hold speech with none but one's fellow-prisoners, and ere I was released and brought on board this ship the Spaniards had made good their escape."

"Ay, but what of Master Jasper Oglander?" interrupted Hartop. "Say you that you have proof against him?"

"I have proof thus far," rejoined Red Bob, "that on that night in December he and his two companions followed you from the ship with intent to get possession of the letter. It was they who assailed you in Beddington Dingle. They possessed themselves of the letter, which, it seemeth, contained news of the Spanish plate fleet. It was on account of that news that they were in so great haste to get back to Spain. Their escape was contrived by Jasper Oglander and his son—"

"Marry come up!" cried Gilbert "Why, then, Timothy Trollope was right after all!"

Red Bob shook his head, and a grim smile played about his lips.

"Timothy Trollope had been righter still if he had finished his work on Polperro beach," said he. "'Tis said that the lad ran his rapier through young Philip Oglander. Haply he did so; but of this I am certain, that young Philip Oglander is at this moment on board the Pearl on his way to Spain, with intent to inform the Spanish king of the setting out of this present expedition to waylay the plate fleet. That, my master, is the sum of what I know, and if there be aught else that you would question me upon, my name on the ship's books is Robert Cruse, and you will find me when on duty in the carpenter's quarters." And so saying, he again touched his forelock and proceeded on his way into the forecastle.

Thus, when it was too late to relent, did Gilbert learn of his injustice towards Timothy Trollope. He reflected that had he only believed in Timothy's report of the character of Jasper and Philip Oglander, much mischief might have been averted. For it needed no assurance from Jacob Hartop to bring him to understand to the full all that might follow from the escape of the Spanish prisoners. They were now on their way to Spain, apparently with the object of hastening to King Philip and informing him of the starting of Lord Thomas Howard's expedition to the Azores; and the result of their intelligence would no doubt be that the Spanish king would endeavour by all the means in his power to frustrate the English designs upon his treasure-ships.

Gilbert spoke of these things with Roland Grenville, but young Grenville regarded them with small concern, and reminded Gilbert that Lord Thomas Howard was well acquainted with the situation, for that he had given instructions to all his captains to keep a constant watch for the Pearl, to the end that if any should sight her she was to be pursued and captured, or else sent to the bottom with a well-directed shot.

But if any strange vessels were espied they were only peaceful traders bearing our own flag of St. George, or else one or two of the Earl of Cumberland's fleet, which were at that time cruising off the coasts of Spain. Certain it is that the Pearl did not come within sight of any on board the Revenge, for her voyage across the Bay of Biscay and thence westward to the Azores was performed without so much as the firing of a single gun. Nor did any event of great moment occur the while on board, or any circumstance worthy of mention, saving only that ere the Western Isles were sighted the men had already begun to grumble much at the quality of their rations and at their bodily discomforts.

For, as if the ill results of bad victualling of the Queen's ships in 1588 had not been a sufficient lesson, the food supplied to the present expedition was of the poorest sort, and it was little wonder that there was much discontent. The beer, of which one gallon each day was supplied to every man and boy, had been stored in old oil and fish barrels, and was so corrupt that many refused to drink of it. The meat was so salt that many said the brine had been put into it for the purpose of disguising the rank foulness thereof. The bread, too, was daily becoming more closely inhabited by maggots, while even the sweetest food was like to become unsavoury by reason of the noisome and poisonous scent of the bilge-water, which was in itself enough, had not the men all been for the most part hale and healthy, to make many a brave sailor food for crabs and sharks.

But if the men grumbled it was as yet only in surly undertones, for all knew that there was good fruit to be had on the island of Flores, and perhaps even some good wine. Furthermore, the Spanish treasure-ships were expected on an early day, when, after a little fighting, as none doubted, our ships would speedily be filled up to the gunwales with bars of gold and ingots of silver and bags of precious stones. And then it would be—Hi! for England and a merry life for the rest of their days!

The thought of that treasure buoyed up the heart of many a man whose spirit might else have failed him in the long days of waiting that were before them. But more than the hope of gain was the hope, which every man in the fleet felt in his inmost heart, of giving a trouncing to the proud Dons of Spain. For assuredly there was no stronger feeling in the British seaman's heart at that time than that of hatred of the Spaniard.

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CHAPTER XV.

IN SEARCH OF THE PLATE FLEET.

IT had been night-time when the fleet cast anchor under shelter of the island of Flores—the most westerly of the Azores; and if any of the younger members of the expedition who had not before gazed upon foreign land had hoped to witness aught that was novel or surprising, they had perforce to content themselves for the time being with the sight of a stretch of dark land rising out of a blue moonlit sea. Here and there, it is true, they could discern the black outline of a tall date-palm against the lighter background of the sky, poised, as it were, on the ridge of some rugged hill. But when the morning came the sloping land could be clearly seen with its terraces of vine and its blossoming orange-trees and its plantations of olives; and at the foot of the cliffs there was a long white line of foam, where the Atlantic rollers broke upon the rocky shores.

The Revenge lay so near to the shore that the people of the island, who had come down from their village on the hillside, could be distinctly seen standing in a group looking out in wonder at the ships. And some of them had even put out their boats and were paddling towards the ships in the hope of doing some trade in the selling of fresh fruit. When they came alongside, certain of the officers bought a few bunches of luscious grapes or baskets of oranges and dates; but what was most required was a supply of fresh water, and for this the English saw no reason why they should pay money or money's worth, and their own boats were better fitted for the carrying of water-beakers than those of the natives. So, ere the sun was yet high above the horizon, two boats of the Revenge were launched, and a like number from each of the other ships, and they were pulled towards the beach.

In one of the Revenge's boats went Gilbert Oglander. He sat at the tiller, and he steered her round under the stern of Jacob Whiddon's bark, the Pilgrim, that lay but a cable's length away from his own ship. As he passed under her high counter one of her own boats shot out from her larboard side, and her men pulled vigorously at their oars as if intent upon having a race. Gilbert glanced at her rowers as she came abreast of him, and as he caught sight of the youth at her helm he started in amazement. For a moment he could not believe the evidence of his own eyes. But when the youth turned half-round with his face full in view there could be no mistake as to his identity, and Gilbert cried aloud in a voice that carried far across the waves:

"Tim! Timothy! Timothy Trollope!"

And Timothy (for it was in truth he) touched his cap in salutation, and answered cheerily:

"Give you good-morrow, Master Oglander. Prithee, hast had a pleasant voyage, withal?"

"Ay, truly," returned Gilbert. "But 'sdeath, Tim, I thought not to see you here!"

And then the boats drew apart, and Timothy remained out of sight in the rear for some ten minutes, until the keels grounded on the pebbles of a little sheltered creek whither the boats from the Defiance had already led the way. And when Gilbert leapt ashore he ran across some rocks to where Timothy's boat was arriving; he caught the painter-rope that was thrown to him, and drew the craft inward through the deep green water to the edge of the rock. As Timothy stepped out, Gilbert, remembering nothing of the disagreement that had come betwixt them, took the lad by the hand and clapped him on the shoulder in very joy.

"Well met!" said he; "well met!" he repeated. "But why, since thou'rt sailing i' the fleet, Tim, didst thou not come aboard the Revenge, quotha? There was ample room for thee."

Timothy smiled awkwardly.

"I cared not a groat which ship I sailed on, so that it were but in the following of my lord the admiral," said he, as he strode over the rough rocks towards a little grassy knoll beyond. "'Tis true I had wished to be aboard one of the Queen's ships rather than on a mere adventurer such as Jacob Whiddon's Pilgrim. Yet so hard did my father urge my staying at home, even to the last day, that 'tis a marvel that I did end by gaining his consent to my coming at all, and it was by sheer good luck that I succeeded in getting a berth with Whiddon."

"Wouldst come aboard the Revenge even now an I got thee entered on her books, Tim?" questioned Gilbert.

"Ay, gladly," returned Timothy; "for I do assure thee the life we have had since leaving Plymouth hath been none too comfortable; and the food is less to be desired than that which I have ofttimes seen bestowed upon the swine at Modbury Manor. As for the beer they give us, I vow I'd rather regale myself on the water out of the sea. Ay, gladly would I join the Revenge. And yet," he added, with a curiously undecided look in his eyes, "'tis surely passing strange, Master Gilbert, that thou shouldst ask me aboard the same ship with thyself, seeing that when last we parted it was upon no friendly terms."

"I should willingly forget and dismiss from my mind the matter that parted us," said Gilbert. "And I will own now that I made a huge mistake in my judgment of thee, Tim. I fear thou wert right in thy estimate of my uncle. I blush to think it, but I am well-nigh convinced that he was, as you said, engaged in plotting on the side of our country's enemies."

"It may be that you will have proof of it when we return to England," observed Timothy. And then with a "God-speed you", he turned and rejoined his shipmates, wondering the while at Master Oglander's friendly feeling towards him.

When Timothy again went on board the Pilgrim he sought out her captain and told him of the offer that Gilbert had made, beseeching Jacob Whiddon to let him join the Revenge if it should so chance that Sir Richard Grenville would have him. Captain Whiddon murmured some objections, saying that his acquaintance with Timothy during the voyage had taught him the lad's value.

"Nevertheless," said he, "if you are a handy man on board this small craft, I doubt not that you would prove even more so in a wider sphere. 'Tis your own advantage that I consider, Timothy, and looking at the matter thus, it would ill become me to refuse your pleading."

For the rest of that day, and during the day that followed, Timothy cast many a longing glance towards the Revenge. So often did he look at the ship that very soon he came to know every rope of her rigging, every spar of her masts, and every plank of her richly-carved and gilded hull. She was a comely vessel, he thought, with her tall poop and her glittering brass guns, her waving flag of St. George, and her crew of merry, stalwart men. But the days passed and yet no message came to him, and he began to think that Gilbert Oglander had surely forgotten all about him.

During these days the ships remained in the same positions as they had taken up when they had cast anchor. At times the boats would be sent ashore, or to one or other of the victuallers; but there was no sign of growing activity, nothing to indicate that the expected treasure-ships were at hand.

Two weeks went by and still all remained as before. But on a certain Monday morning in early April, when Timothy sat with some of the men enjoying the bright sunshine on deck, he observed a boat putting off from the Revenge. He watched it idly, growing more eager when he saw that it was approaching the Pilgrim, and that Gilbert Oglander sat in her stern seats.

Very soon the boat was alongside, and Gilbert climbed up the ship's side ladder and stepped on deck, and strode aft to the captain's cabin. There he remained for many minutes, delivering some message from Sir Richard Grenville. When at length he came again upon the deck he sought out Timothy Trollope—no difficult task, seeing that Tim was patiently waiting for him at the gangway.

"Didst think I had forgotten thee, Tim?" said Gilbert. And then, without waiting for answer he added: "Get thy trappings and baggage ready, lad, and come aboard the Revenge with us; for Sir Richard hath consented to thy coming, and hath bidden me fetch thee."

It occupied Timothy but a few moments to gather his belongings together; for in truth they made but a scanty bundle, needing no great consideration in the packing. With his morion slung basket-wise on his arm, his corselet gripped by the shoulder-straps, his sword dangling at his side, and his small canvas bag of spare clothing carried on his back, he followed Gilbert Oglander into the boat, and waving a farewell to his old shipmates he was rowed alongside the Revenge.

Timothy was somewhat awed by the sight of Lord Thomas Howard on the ship's quarter-deck, where the admiral, arrayed in a suit of spotless gray velvet trimmed with silver lace, paced to and fro in earnest colloquy with Sir Richard Grenville.

Lord Thomas, it seemed, had been making a tour of his fleet that morning, inspecting the ships and giving various instructions to his captains. When Timothy came on board the whole company of the Revenge were being mustered on the upper deck. Gilbert Oglander presented him to the purser, who straightway entered his name on the ship's books.

When the roll had been called, the admiral and the vice-admiral, standing at the forward rail of the quarter-deck, looked down upon the sea of sunburnt faces and continued their conversation. Presently Sir Richard Grenville leaned over the rail and spoke to one of the officers who stood below.

"Master Tremayne," said he, "send me up the man Hartop—Jacob Hartop."

And when the word had been passed forward, Jacob Hartop strode towards the stairs and mounted to the quarter-deck, where he saluted the two great men.

Lord Thomas Howard signed to him to approach nearer, saying at the same time:

"It seemeth you are passing well acquainted with these islands, my man?"

"I have good reason to know them well, my lord," returned Jacob. "I lost my ship off this same island of Flores—a ship that was loaded even to the gunwales with Spanish treasure—and for two weeks I cruised among the Azores in an open boat in search of a vessel to fetch me home to England. I have been ashore on every island in the group, and have lived in Terceira for full three months. Yes, my lord, so please you, I know them well."

"Good!" nodded the admiral. "And I doubt not you can manage a small boat if need be?"

"Ay, or a large," said Jacob. "I am well trained in navigation, as Sir Richard Grenville can avouch."

"Enough," said Lord Thomas. And then, becoming more familiar in his tone of speech, he told Jacob that he had a mind to send him off for a cruise to the westward with the purpose of keeping an outlook for the appearance of the Spanish treasure-ships. "You shall have a good, swift-sailing fly-boat," he said, "and may choose your own companions for crew. And when you catch sight of the plate fleet it shall be your object to hasten back with all speed to our anchorage here and warn us of their coming."

"Right well do I understand," agreed Jacob. "Prithee, when do I set off?"

"When you list," said Lord Thomas; "but at noon to-day at the latest, for it may be that they are already within a day's sail of the islands."

So Jacob Hartop, having received full instructions, returned to the upper deck. And as he was passing the main-mast he caught sight of Timothy Trollope and touched him on the elbow, bidding him follow him.

"I am glad to see thee aboard of us, Master Timothy," said he, shaking the lad by the hand. "And in truth you are in goodly time. Art willing for an adventure, lad?"

"Ay, in faith am I that," said Tim. "I am ill of this weary waiting and ceaseless idleness. But what mean you by adventure, Master Hartop?"

Then Jacob opened out to him his plans for the cruise in search of the enemy, and asked him to be one of his little crew.

Timothy at first leapt gladly at the proposal, but at the next moment he shook his head in doubt.

"How will it be," said he, "if the Spaniards should come before we return? I should then see naught of the fighting, and I would not for anything in the world miss such an experience."

"You need have no fear as to that, my boy," returned Jacob, "for shall we not be the first to see them when they come? Yea, 'tis for that reason that we go, so that we may hasten back and give the alarm. Come, be not afraid that we shall miss aught by our absence; for I do vouch for it that if you remain on board the Revenge it will be but a weary time of waiting and inactivity, whereas in our boat we shall at the least be moving from place to place with the chance of adventure. I had thought that you would rejoice at the opportunity, as did Master Oglander when I broached the matter to him."

Timothy's face brightened up at these last words.

"You had not told me that Master Gilbert was to come," said he. "In that case, I will certainly consent."

"'Twas he who bade me ask you," remarked Hartop; "for you must know that we had word of the thing full three days ago, when Sir Richard Grenville, with more impatience than my Lord Thomas hath yet shown, saw the merit of sending out scouts, and made up his mind to speak with Lord Thomas as he hath done this morning."

In something less than an hour's time Jacob was ready with his little crew, which he had chosen with the thought of friendliness rather than with any regard to their special fitness for the expedition. The old gunner, Edward Webbe, was a useful man, in that he could not only manage a boat, but could also, if necessary, speak with any Spaniards or Portuguese in their own tongue, and he also knew the islands. Timothy Trollope was strong for the pulling of an oar when the wind would not serve for the use of the sail, while Gilbert Oglander had marvellously keen eye-sight, and might therefore be depended upon for a look-out. Young Robin Redfern was chosen for no greater reason than that he had pleaded to accompany Master Oglander, and because he was of no great bulk and would therefore occupy very little room in a boat whose accommodation was limited. All five were disguised as fishers, and their boat, which was rigged with a lateen-sail, might well be mistaken at a distance for a Biscayan fishing-boat. The provisions wherewith she was stored were sufficient to serve for two weeks.

A light breeze from the south-east blew over the sea as Jacob Hartop took his little craft out of the roadstead at the north of Flores Island where the fleet lay at anchor. A projecting headland soon hid the ships from view, and towards evening the land itself was but a dim blue line on the horizon in the east. At nightfall the crew was divided into watches, and Timothy, Webbe, and Robin Redfern slept while Hartop and Gilbert remained awake, keeping the boat before the wind as she sailed ever westward. But at sunrise on the next morning the course was altered to the south, and so maintained until noon, when it was again altered to the north. And so, backward and forward, north and south, the cruising was kept up day after day. But it was not until the evening of the ninth day that a single sail was sighted.

It was Robin Redfern who caught the first glimpse of the vessel—a mere dark speck against the sunset sky.

"They are coming! they are coming!" he cried, half in terror and half in joy. And in a moment his four companions were standing up on the boat's half-deck and gazing out with searching eyes across the ocean.

"What make you of her, Master Oglander?" questioned Jacob Hartop in a quiet, deeply earnest tone as he gripped one of the stays to steady himself while the boat rose to meet the great Atlantic rollers.

Gilbert shielded his eyes from the strong light of the sunset as he stood with one arm clasped about the mast.

"'Tis a goodly ship in the matter of size," he presently said; "yet I can see but little of her hull, for she is bow-on, sailing eastward as it seemeth."

"Haply 'tis one of their quick-sailing advance guards," suggested Webbe.

But Hartop silently continued to look out upon the sea with his brows bent and an expression of grim expectancy in his cold gray eyes.

"Canst make out if there be more than one ship?" he asked after a long pause. "Mark it well, my boy; for it were best that we make the matter full certain ere we fly back with the alarm."

Gilbert's eyes slowly swept the line of the horizon.

"No," he said; "there is but the one."

"Then we may not yet return," said Hartop; and turning to Timothy Trollope he added: "Take you the tiller, Tim, and keep our head to the westward until the dusk hath fallen. By that time we should know more."

The wind served well for this new course, and the boat sped on. But when the sun had sunk the strange ship could no more be seen, for the bright yellow afterglow was speedily obscured by a gray sea-mist.

Earlier on that same day they had observed that the sea was plentifully strewn with tufts of sea-weed, and below their boat, when they had looked over the gunwale and peered down into the depths of the water, they had seen dense forests of marine growth thickly entangled, and many thousands of jelly-fish and other denizens of the deep.

Jacob Hartop had shown more interest and concern in this fact than any of his companions.

"'Tis for all the world like what I have seen many times in the Sargasso Sea," said he. "And yet it cannot surely be that we have come so far to the westward as that."

But as the evening wore on and the water became yet more densely full of living things, he shook his head gravely and murmured a wish that they had turned back towards the Azores. "For," said he, "if it be that we are on the fringe of the Sargasso Sea there is no knowing what may befall us."

"And prithee, Jacob, what manner of dangers do you fear?" questioned Edward Webbe. "Sure there can be no peril in sailing over a forest of harmless sea-weeds."

"'Twas in the Sargasso Sea that I lost my ship," said Jacob. "I know the place full well, and never do I wish to be back in it again. Hast never heard of it, Ned?"

Webbe shook his head and smiled as he answered:

"Mayhap I have heard the name. But it seemeth to me that we are now in the Atlantic Ocean; and if thou dost declare that we are nigh unto any other sea, why, I can only believe that thou art dreaming."

"Well do I know that we are in the Atlantic," returned Hartop, "though a good piece farther to the westward than we had intended. But you must know that this Sargasso Sea of which I speak, is itself a part of the Atlantic—and a part which all wise mariners do avoid. 'Tis in places naught but a solid mass of sea-weed, so dense as to support the weight of a man, yea, even of a ship. Once within its confines, 'tis rare that a vessel doth ever escape; and most men who have been through it will tell you strange and marvellous tales of hideous monsters with hundreds of arms, that dart out and entwine in their grip of death all who come within their venomous reach."

"Then I pray you let us adventure no farther," said Webbe, "for I, at least, have no great wish to be embraced by such arms. Let us turn back, Jacob."

"I would that we were once more aboard of the Revenge," muttered young Robin Redfern, who lay stretched upon the half-deck at Gilbert Oglander'a feet. "Who knows but that the Spaniards have already passed us, and been overmastered and taken home to England."

"There can be little harm in keeping on our present course until sunrise," said Jacob Hartop, not heeding the boy's remark. "Then, if we see no sign of the plate fleet, we can turn about and make a run for Flores."

"Ay," added Webbe, "it were even wise to turn at the first peep of dawn; for, mind you, it would go ill with us if we should find ourselves in the very midst of the galleons without a chance of escape."

And so they held on westward; and when darkness fell over the sea, Hartop and Gilbert curled themselves up under their rugs in the boat's well and went to sleep, leaving Timothy in charge of the tiller and Webbe and Robin on the watch forward.

It may be that the recent mention of the loss of his ship lingered in Jacob's mind as he fell asleep, for, as he dreamt, he saw himself once again upon her deck. A great galleon she was. He had won her in battle from the Spaniards, and as she was a better vessel than his own poor craft, he had converted her to his own use, and taking his own crew aboard of her had hoisted the red cross of St George and cruised with her as a buccaneer on the Spanish Main, conquering many another ship of Spain and transferring their treasures to his own hold, until the galleon was weighed down almost to her lower port-holes with the weight of gold that she carried. And then on a certain night when he was homeward bound he lay in his cabin asleep, and there had come to him one of the ship's boys to tell him that the galleon had sprung a leak and was sinking. He heard the boy calling him now as he lay in his dreams in the Revenge's boat, sailing on those same seas.

"Master Hartop!" the boy cried, laying his hand on the old buccaneer's breast. "Master Hartop! Quick! quick!"

Jacob turned over and sat up, and found himself not in his ship's cabin but in an open boat. And the boy who had called him was young Robin Redfern, who now stood over him with a face as white as the sea-foam, and with his hand that held the boat's lantern trembling as if with palsy.

"'Sdeath, boy!" cried Hartop. "What in the world hath happened?"

Robin raised his free hand and pointed over the boat's gunwale across the water.

"Look!" he cried. "What can it mean?"

---

CHAPTER XVI.

THE GREEN LIGHT UPON THE SEA.

JACOB was on his feet in a moment. His eyes were dazed by a strange pale-green light that shone luminous over the boat's larboard bow. The sea was calm, with only a gentle swell rolling from the east; the sky was black and starless, and all was dark around saving only in the one direction where shone the ghostly green light, that reared itself like a cloud of radiant mist out of the sea, only a few yards from where he stood.

Even as he gazed upon it, bewildered and speechless, the light seemed to approach, or else it was the boat that sailed into the luminance. It shed its ghastly green glare upon everything, making all on board as plain as though the craft were bathed in soft moonlight. All was as green as grass. Webbe, Timothy, and Gilbert stood staring about them like phantoms, silently glancing at one another with the emotions of men who had been suddenly hurried into another world. Their faces, their clothing, even their hair was green, and it seemed that the mysterious light had deprived them of speech, for none spoke.

Timothy Trollope, who had been at the helm, had suddenly ceased to pay any regard to the steering, and now the boat's sail swayed idly to and fro, empty of wind. Gilbert Oglander, regaining his sober senses, looked over the side to search for the origin of the strange radiance. But there was no flame to the light, which seemed to be a mere transparent shaft of air, as unsubstantial as a rainbow. And when he turned to see if Jacob Hartop were yet awake, and found the old man at his side, he implored an explanation of the mystery.

"What means it, Master Hartop?" he asked in an awe-stricken voice. "Hast seen its like ever before?"

But the old buccaneer made no answer. Clambering over the coaming of the well, he crept on hands and knees towards the bow near where Gilbert stood. He peered out into the light, gripping the gunwale with trembling hands. He remained thus for many moments. Then suddenly he drew back, flung his left arm round Gilbert's legs, and with a wild, frantic cry upon his lips pointed out with his skinny right hand into the midst of the green light.

"See! see!" he cried. "It is a ship!"

Gilbert's eyes followed the direction in which the old man pointed, and presently he discovered, at the farther fringe of the light, the towering form of a vessel's hull. He could clearly see her stern port-holes, with the gallery above them, and above the gallery the projecting rail of her poop-deck. Her counter was richly carved with many strange devices, and the carvings were covered with tarnished gold. Her stout masts rose high above her, and her ragged sails were ample evidence that it was long since the ship had known their use.

"Can you not see her?" continued Hartop. "Od's life, boy! Look where I point."

"I see her, Master Hartop," returned Gilbert; "I see her. 'Tis a galleon, and a Spaniard by her build."

"Ay, faith, a galleon indeed," nodded Hartop; "and a galleon upon which mine eyes now look not for the first time, if she be not a ghost!" He rose to his feet, still keeping his arm about Gilbert, and added in a strange, dry voice that was scarcely more than a breath: "'Tis a ghost, Master Oglander, 'tis a ghost that you look upon—the ghost of the Golden Galleon!"

And so saying, he turned from the sight and sank upon the narrow deck, covering his face with his hands.

By this time Timothy Trollope also had seen the galleon. Clasping the tiller, he held it over. But it had no effect, for the pinnace had no way upon her; the wind had fallen to an absolute calm, and the sail hung loose and motionless against the mast.

"Out with the sweeps!" cried Edward Webbe, and Timothy, leaving his post, took up one of the long oars, while Gilbert Oglander took the other, and together they pulled and pulled, striving to bring the boat round and so escape from the grim phantom galleon. But with the first stroke they made their oar-blades caught in a mesh of sea-weeds. The disturbed water flashed with phosphorescent fire, and when the oars were with difficulty dragged up they rose dripping with a shower of sparks and heavy with clinging weeds. Again the oars were dipped, and again they were weighted with the tangled growth of weeds.

"'Tis of no avail, Tim," declared Gilbert as he drew in his oar. He leaned over the boat's side and looked down into the calm, shadowy water, where fitful tracks of shining white light showed the movements of coiling writhing monsters of the deep.

"Nay, pull at your oars!" cried Jacob Hartop, rising now from the deck and slipping down into the well. "Let us not be carried nearer to that horrid ship! Dip not your blades so deep, but pull her round that we may get beyond this phantom light. Here, Ned," he added to Webbe, "take thou a hand of Timothy's oar, while I give a help to Gilbert. 'Twill go ill if four of us cannot move her. Robin, my lad, get thee to the tiller and steer us back into the darkness."

He looked aft to where Robin stood and saw the lad obediently approach the tiller, while he himself pulled at Gilbert's oar. The boat began to move, but scarcely had a second stroke of the oars been made when a frantic scream came from Robin Redfern, and the lad, starting forward, plunged himself headlong into the midst of his companions.

"In heaven's name, what hath bewitched the lad?" cried Hartop. He abandoned the oar and bent down to pick Robin up, and felt him trembling in every limb. The boy was comforted by the touch of human hands, but he positively refused to return to the helm.

"I cannot, I cannot!" he cried.

"Take you the oar, then, Robin," said Timothy, "while I go."

But Timothy, bold though he was, came back even more quickly than Robin had done, with his face transfixed with terror.

"Look! look!" he stammered, pointing with fearful eagerness to the boat's stern.

All turned their gaze towards the tiller, and saw something which might well fill them with dread. A long flesh-like arm, half-pink half-green, was gliding slowly over the gunwale, with the movements of a huge caterpillar. Its farther end was not visible at first, but Gilbert Oglander, glancing over into the water, traced the thing for many yards to where it was rooted in a great green shining body midway between the boat and the galleon. The body was furnished with two great glaring eyes as large as plates. From near the eyes some eight or nine other arms or tentacles were stretched forth, some lying inactive on the water's surface, others poised in the green air, with rows of immense sucking discs on their under side; and two of them had climbed up the galleon's hull and were entwined about her like a pair of giant serpents. All this Gilbert perceived in a momentary glance. But he told naught of the matter to his mates. Going down on his hands and knees in the boat's well he crept to one of the little lockers that were under the side-seats. He pulled open the door, thrust in his arm end brought out two swords, and flung one of them to Timothy.

"FOR THE LOVE OF HEAVEN CUT THE THING IN TWAIN!"

"Here, Tim, quick!" he cried. "For the love of heaven cut the thing in twain!"

Then again thrusting his arm into the locker he brought out an axe, which he gripped in his hand. Springing aft to the stern, he then began to hew at the monstrous arm at the part which was lying across the gunwale. Timothy got to the other side, and in like manner struck with all his might at the creature. Stroke after stroke of sword and axe fell upon the writhing thing.

Suddenly the boat swayed over, the sail drew wind, and as suddenly the mysterious green light flickered, faded, flickered again, and then faded into utter darkness. There was a faint splash under the stern.

"'Tis done!" shouted Timothy, stamping his heel on the severed portion of the monster's arm as it lay across the deck. "Give us a hand here, Master Webbe, and help us to heave this thing overboard. Touch it not but with your boot, lest it sting you with its poison. Now, all together!"

"Down with the helm!" cried Hartop, himself springing to the tiller. And then, as the remnant of the animal's tentacle was plunged into the sea, the pinnace moved slowly onward over the darkened waters, and the little crew breathed in thankful freedom. Yet a strange superstitious terror had seized upon them, and for a long time no word was spoken and no sound heard but the creaking of the ropes, the light bubbling of the water at the bow, and the intermittent sobbing of young Robin Redfern. They yearned for the coming of daylight, and dreaded every moment that the eerie green light might again surround them. Again and again Jacob Hartop as he sat at the tiller glanced furtively behind him, as if to assure himself that he was not being pursued by what he firmly believed to be the phantom of his lost ship. Timothy Trollope, too, whose simple and untutored mind had yielded to the same superstitious fear that was oppressing the skipper, stood up time after time and, rubbing his eyes, glanced backward across the sea. Gilbert Oglander had but an uneasy sleep, while Webbe, who sat with his legs outstretched before him and his back firmly planted against the boat's side-planks, refused to close his eyes. The only one who slept peacefully was Robin, who had literally cried himself to sleep.

At last, in the eastern sky there appeared the faint gray gleam of coming dawn. The welcome light crept over sky and sea. The men could now see each other's pale and troubled faces, and then, for the first time since the mysterious green radiance had vanished, Jacob Hartop spoke.

"It hath been a most merciful escape," said he, "a most merciful deliverance. The Lord be thanked!"

"Ay, the Lord be thanked!" murmured Edward Webbe.

The two old men had been feasting their eyes on the dawn-light over in the east. But Gilbert Oglander, who now rose to his feet and faced the westward, gave a slight start and quietly placed his hand on Hartop's shoulder.

"The galleon is still in sight, Master Hartop," said he.

"Ay," echoed Timothy Trollope, "she is still in sight."

Slowly and deliberately Jacob turned his head. His hand lost its hold of the tiller. Slowly he looked back again at his companions.

"What means it?" he muttered hoarsely through his dry, parched lips. His face was ashen gray and woefully haggard. He seemed to have aged a score of years since the last evening. "What means it?" he repeated dryly.

"It seemeth to me," said Gilbert, "that your golden galleon is no ghost after all, but a veritable floating ship."

"Said you not that she was loaded with Spanish treasure, Master Hartop?" questioned Timothy.

Jacob nodded.

"As full laden as ever ship could be," he answered.

"And wilt thou leave her there, where she is, to drift at random on the wide sea, to rot upon the water, and to go down at last to bestow her treasure upon the mermaids? I pray thee, let us go back to her, that we may bring away with us some of the gold whereof thou hast spoken."

"What!" cried Hartop, fixing his glassy eyes in astonishment upon the bold lad.

"'Tis daylight now," pursued Tim. "Mark how the coming sunlight spreads across the sky. Mark how its bright reflection gleams upon your galleon's golden hull. Why need we fear to approach her, ay, or even to board her, in the broad light of day?"

Hartop shook his head in grave rebuke.

"Thou'rt over bold, Master Timothy," said he. "The ship were a wealthy prize, I will allow. But I would have thee know that 'twas not to ransack drifting derelicts that we came out upon this voyage, but in quest of King Philip's plate fleet. Having failed to discover the fleet in our allotted time, we shall now return to Queen Elizabeth's ships at Flores and inform Her Majesty's admiral of the result of our quest. As for the golden galleon, let her rot, let her sink, say I. Let her treasures go down to the mermaids' halls, that the precious gems may bedeck the mermaids' necks withal. It will not be the first ship-load of Spanish doubloons that hath gone unto the depths for the children of the ocean to play with. And I say to you, were the galleon thrice her size, with thrice her present wealth aboard of her, I would not turn back a fathom's distance with the thought of entering her. And now," he added, "I pray you, just hitch me up another inch or two of the peak halliard there, while Gilbert doth set about preparing our breakfast."

And so they sailed back to Flores.

---

CHAPTER XVII.

SIR RICHARD GRENVILLE.

FOUR months went by—four months of weary, monotonous waiting—and still Lord Thomas Howard's fleet lay in its old anchorage in the roadstead off the north of Flores Island. The long-expected homeward-bound treasure flota from the Spanish Main had not yet come in sight. The King of Spain, who was now well aware of the presence of the English ships at the Azores, and who knew their drift as surely as did Lord Thomas himself, was sensible of how much the safety of his galleons concerned his own interests and the interests of his country; and by secret means he had communicated with his admirals at Nombre de Dios, causing them to delay their starting; for he chose to hazard the perishing of ships, men, and goods by bringing them over in a season of storms rather than endanger their falling into our hands.

He had two distinct designs in bringing his fleet home so late. One was that he thought that Lord Thomas would have consumed his victuals and have been forced accordingly to abandon his quest and return to England; and the other was that he might meanwhile gain time to furnish a great fleet, which he was preparing to act as the guardian of his treasure galleons. In the first design he found himself deceived, for Admiral Howard had not been two months at the Western Isles ere he received supplies of victuals from England; and in the second he was equally prevented, for the Earl of Cumberland, who was then cruising off the coast of Spain, was keeping a constant watch upon the port of Ferrol, where the new armada was being hurriedly fitted out, and Cumberland was prepared to send intelligence to Flores to warn Lord Thomas at the moment of danger.

But despite the arrival of supplies from home, the provisions of the English fleet at the Azores were meagre in quantity, and in quality wretchedly poor, and it was found necessary to add to them by making frequent raids upon the nearer islands and taking forcible possession of food from the islanders' homesteads. The hot summer months of June and July had brought additional discomforts to the crews, and early in August a pestilent sickness spread from ship to ship. On the Defiance a score of men had died before the middle of August, and an equal number of the ship's company of the Lion were carried off. Sir Robert Cross of the Bonaventure had buried in the sea no fewer than thirty-six of his picked men, and the disease in a more or less virulent form had made an entrance upon every one of the Queen's six ships, as well as the victuallers, fly-boats, and small pinnaces that were of the expedition. Jacob Whiddon's little ship, the Pilgrim, had escaped so far with but one death.

On board the Revenge Sir Richard Grenville had much ado to stem the tide of the dread visitation. His ship was small, and her crowded crew had but indifferent accommodation even when in good health, and when the illness seized them there was little chance of a recovery. The matter was made worse by the fact that, for want of a more convenient hospital, her sick men were forced to lie upon the ballast, down below, where no fresh air could reach them, where the light of the sun could not penetrate, and where even the best and freshest food became speedily rank and nasty. Her surgeons were ignorant men, of a low and ill-educated class, to whom the payment of five shillings a week was considered an ample return for the exercise of their profession. Of medicine and the laws of health they scarcely knew anything. They could saw off a shattered limb or patch a broken head passing well; but they had no more than a child's skill in dealing with a sickness that came of bad sanitation, putrid food, and insidious infection. The ship's lower decks were so pestilential that a sound man might hardly hope to go below without catching the disease.

At the first it was the men of the commoner sort, the working mariners and the ill-fed soldiers, who were affected, but betimes the gentlemen of the poop were struck down one by one by the fell complaint, and there were few among them who did not suffer in some wise, if it were no more than to experience a sickly headache. So general did the complaints become, that many of the men, led by Red Bob, threatened more than once to break out into open mutiny. They declared that they were being poisoned by sour beer and rancid meat, and day after day, as the expected treasure-ships failed to come into view, the discontent became stronger and more noisy.

Sir Richard Grenville held a firm and determined authority over his ship's company, however, for he was a most resolute man, and none dared to openly offend him. He was a man very unquiet in his mind, always eager and impatient, and greatly affected to war. It was perhaps from this same resolute spirit that he had been able to perform the many valiant acts that are recorded of him. At the age of sixteen he had distinguished himself for bravery and fearlessness in the wars in Hungary under the Emperor Maximilian against the Turks; he had fought in the great sea-fight at Lepanto with the Christians against the Turks, when thirty thousand of the Saracens fell or were taken prisoners, and twelve thousand Christian slaves were liberated. Also he had taken prominent part in the defeat of the Spanish Armada. Of his life in Virginia, whither he went to found the first English colony, many heroic acts are recorded. His rivals thought him harsh and overbearing, and certify that he exercised a most tyrannical rule over his colonists and shipmates from first to last; and Master Ralph Lane (who is remembered as being the first to introduce the herb tobacco into England) wrote of him in an ample discourse addressed to Sir Walter Raleigh, that Grenville's pride was intolerable, his ambition insatiable, and that his proceedings towards them all in Virginia, and to Lane in particular, were unendurable. It seems certain that among the islanders of the Azores he was greatly feared for his severity in leading his men to plunder the homesteads for food for the ships. Some things that are written of him show that at times he could be boastful and inclined to bravado.

"He was of so hard a complexion," says Jan van Linschoten in a document that is to be found in Hakluyt's Voyages, "that as he continued among the Spanish captains while they were at dinner or supper with him, he would carouse three or four glasses of wine, and in a bravery take the glasses between his teeth and crash them in pieces and swallow them down, so that oftentimes the blood ran out of his mouth, without any harm at all unto him. And this was told me by divers credible persons that many times stood and beheld him."

Yet he was a very excellent gentleman, a loyal subject of the Queen, and a very proper Christian. In an age when cruelty in war was common he fought with a truly British sense of fairness, and while the Spaniards treated their prisoners with unnameable tortures Sir Richard Grenville was ever just and humane with the enemies who fell into his hands. He hated the Spaniards with a fierce envenomed hatred, and was never known to shrink from an encounter with them, or to neglect a chance of striking a blow which should help to lessen their vaunted power upon the seas. No man in his time—not even Drake himself—was more bold or more courageous in attacking them. His self-confidence and his trust in English pluck were supreme. He considered an Englishman equal to any dozen Spaniards.

On one occasion when he was returning from the Spanish Main in a ship which had been sorely battered by storms and badly bored by the teredo-worm, he sighted a richly-laden galleon. His ship could not be brought to a close encounter, and he had no boats, yet he was bent upon capturing that galleon. So he made a raft out of the boards of chests and boxes, took a handful of men with him, and on this frail craft adventured an attack. He brought the raft alongside the galleon and clambered up upon her decks. As soon as his men were all off the raft it fell asunder and sank at the galleon's side, thus cutting off the adventurers' retreat. Yet they captured the galleon and brought her home as a prize to England.

It was towards the end of the hot month of August that the sickness on board the Revenge, as on board all the other ships of the fleet, became more general and severe. Lord Thomas Howard, realizing at last that it was the ships themselves that were unhealthy, and that if he would preserve his little army from actual dissolution he had better institute an hospital of some sort on shore, issued orders to his various captains, instructing them to land their sick men upon the beach, where huts and tents and other shelters were erected. This proceeding was found to be of vast benefit. Each ship's company was kept separate in their own shelters, with a goodly number of healthy men to attend to their wants.

Gilbert Oglander and Roland Grenville were among those who were told off to take charge of the Revenge's invalids. Timothy Trollope and Robin Redfern were with them, acting for the greater part of the time as water-carriers. Red Bob was among the sick, so was Edward Webbe. Hartop remained on board the ship.

It was weary work looking after men who, in the midst of their sickness, were for ever grumbling at the bad food and the lack of good doctors. But the purer air and an abundance of fresh water, together with such ripe fruit as could be procured, gradually brought the sufferers round to a better condition. The deaths were fewer and the pestilence ceased to spread. Also on the thirtieth day of the month there arrived two ships from England, sent out by the merchants of Plymouth with a supply of victuals; and the news of home brought additional cheer to those who had been lingering here in the Azores for over five months, waiting for the treasure-ships that they were to waylay and capture, waiting until the very clothes on their backs were worn to rags.

---

CHAPTER XVIII.

DRUSILLA'S LETTER.

ON the morning following the arrival of the ships, boats were sent shoreward for water and for shingle. The shingle was required for ballast, the old and polluted ballast having been cast overboard in the endeavour to clear the vessels of the infection.

Jacob Hartop was in charge of one of the boats from the Revenge, and all through the day he laboured in the heat of the sun with his men, shovelling shingle into his boat and making trip after trip between the shore and the ship. When he landed on his second trip he sought out Gilbert Oglander.

Gilbert looked very different now from the gaily-apparelled lad who had gone on board the vice-admiral's ship at Plymouth in the early spring-time. His face was burned to a rich ruddy brown; his clothes were soiled and ragged, the gilt lace trimmings tarnished; the feathers had been torn from his cap, which was now but a sorry covering for his long-grown hair. Like all his companions, he had, for reasons of economy as much as for those of comfort and convenience, altogether abandoned his boots, and his bare feet, like his face and hands and arms, were as sunburnt as those of a Sicilian fisherman. He was kneeling in the shade of a large spreading date-palm, peeling a ripe orange for Red Bob, when Jacob Hartop approached him. He glanced up and nodded to the old buccaneer, smiled in greeting, and proceeded to divide the orange into liths, handing them one by one to his patient.

Jacob sat down on the soft warm sand and watched the lad for a few moments in silence.

"Art weary, Jacob?" asked Gilbert, hearing the old man's heavy breathing.

"Ay, weary of waiting for the Dons," answered Jacob, bending over and taking up a handful of the sand and letting it slowly stream out again between his gnarled fingers. Then presently he added: "Thou hast heard of the coming of the two ships from home,—eh, Master Gilbert?"

"Yes," returned Gilbert, wiping his hot brow with the back of his hand. "Phew! Would that they had brought a few hogsheads of our Devonshire cider with them. But that were too much to expect, methinks." He rose to his feet and stood beside Jacob, with his hands lightly clasped behind his back, and gazed out upon the sea towards where the little Revenge rode at anchor. "Hast heard aught of their news, Master Hartop?" he asked.

Hartop shook his head.

"Naught to speak of," he answered. "It seemeth that Sir Francis Drake hath been summoned to Her Majesty's court, where he is in great favour, and that Sir Walter Raleigh hath fallen into disgrace; but more than this I have heard nothing. It may be, however, that thou'lt learn more from the letter that I bring thee," he added, thrusting his hand into his doublet. "Sir Richard bade me give it thee, saying as he handed it unto me, 'Tell Master Oglander that I would willingly have kept the letter myself, for that by the superscription I do judge it to be a message from my little sweetheart Drusilla'."

Gilbert fairly leapt at the letter when it was produced.

"It is! It is from Drusilla!" he cried, as he glanced at his name upon it. "'Twas she indeed that writ it!" Whereupon he pressed the missive to his lips, glanced at it yet again, and then exclaimed; "Only to think on't, Jacob! Is't not truly passing strange that my sister had this in her hand—ay, and haply kissed it as I do now—scarcely a month ago!" He was about to break the seal, but he forebore. "Nay," he said, "I will not read it now. Let me wait until the joy of receiving it hath abated;" and kissing it again he thrust it securely under his belt and went once more among the sick men, attending to their wants, and giving them such cheer as they had not known for many a day.

In the afternoon, when most of the invalids were asleep, Gilbert escaped from the beach and climbed the high bank of land to the level ground above, where the olive-trees grew. He perched himself upon one of the lower boughs of one of the largest of the trees, and, resting his back against the main trunk, took out his letter.

It had been written, not at Modbury Manor but at Willoughby Grange, the Devonshire seat of Sir Lester Willoughby. Gilbert read it slowly, dwelling on each word with fond interest.

Writ at Willoughby Grange, in the County of
Devon, the 5th day of August, 1591.

I know not, dear my brother Gilbert, if this letter will ever reach thee, but Master Christopher Pym hath but now ridden hence from Plymouth to tell me that the good ship "Barbara Jane" is being fitted to sail to the Western Isles with victuals for the Lord Thomas Howard his fleet, and to bid me write to thee in the hope that if thou art alive (as I pray God thou be) thou shall know hereby the things which have befallen us in thy so long absence, and of how Jasper Oglander hath proved himself to be a most iniquitous person with no good in him, who hath been secretly working to the ruination of our home and family, to the uttermost grief and distress of our saintly mother.

These things I must confide to thee, dear Gilbert, even in the order in which they happened; for 'tis meet that thou shouldst know them at the soonest possible time, so that thou mayest come back to us, if haply thou canst, and aid us in our tribulation. Yet even now, as I do indite these lines, I can scarce put the matter in its true order, so much confused am I in mind concerning all that hath disturbed our happiness, and so greatly do I fear (despite Master Pym's assurances) that thou art indeed and in truth dead and gone, as Jasper hath so positively averred. Of this terrible report of thine untimely death, we have no assurance either of truth or of disproof, and can only devoutly pray (as we do daily and nightly pray) that 'tis yet another of Jasper Oglander's evil and wicked falsehoods, set forth to gain his own advantage and advancement. But alas! I much fear me that I shall never, never see thee again, and that thou art, as the letter said, no more in this world.

We were concerned (as thou knowest) about the strange absence of cousin Philip. It was said by his father that he had gone on horseback upon a journey of pleasure into the country. But this report hath been proved false, utterly false. Philip is even at this present time abroad in Spain, working in league with our country's enemies. We learnt it at the time of our dear grandfather's sudden death—

Gilbert started back in amazement as he read these last words, almost falling from his seat on the olive-tree.

"Grandfather's death!" he cried aghast, dropping the letter on his lap. And then, as in a flash, his thoughts sped back to the time of his leaving Plymouth and the sight of the flag flying at half-mast on the towers of Modbury Manor. "Grandfather's sudden death!" he repeated, and for many minutes his brain seemed to be stunned by the news. His tear-filled eyes wandered eastward across the broad blue sea. Far away in the mid-distance between him and the clear horizon he saw, almost unconsciously, a little ship ploughing her way under full sail onward in the direction of Flores. At any other time and in a different mood the sight of that ship, where ships were so seldom to be seen, would have aroused in him a keen concern. But now he gave it only an instant's thought, and turned to continue the reading of Drusilla's letter.

We learnt it at the time of our dear grandfather's sudden death, which befell within an hour after thou hadst gone off to join the "Revenge". A messenger had ridden in hot haste to the manor, bearing a letter for grandfather. What the letter contained and whence it had come we knew not; nor could it be found anywhere in the library. But later, when, at the instance of our mother, Jasper took horse for Plymouth to warn thee of what had happened and bring thee back if there were yet time, Christopher Pym came within to our mother and handed her the letter, saying that he had discovered it at the spot where uncle Jasper had mounted his horse, and declaring that the letter had fallen from Jasper's belt. The letter was from Master Peter Trollope in Plymouth, and it told that both Jasper and Philip Oglander were traitors; that it was they who had contrived the escape of the Spanish prisoners of war, and that Philip Oglander had sailed with them for Spain in the ship "Pearl", which Jasper had purchased, from Sir Walter Raleigh out of money stolen, on the night ye wot of, from poor old Jacob Hartop.

Master Pym hath always held to the belief that 'twas the shock of reading this letter that brought about my Lord Champernoun's death.

Greatly were we all concerned when we heard that the "Revenge" had set sail, and that thou hadst departed in her. 'Tis hard to believe, but Master Pym doth continually aver that Jasper (although 'tis certain he had ample time to warn thee) purposely held back from seeing thee or telling thee of my lord's death, desiring that thou shouldst quit the country in ignorance and run the risk of death by battle or storm, rather than that thou shouldst return home to thy rightful heritage, and so deprive him of his heart's desire. For it is now manifest to us all that Jasper, even from the first moment of his landing in Plymouth, hath been scheming and planning how he might cheat thee of thy rights, and become himself the Baron Champernoun and the owner of Modbury Manor and all the family estates.

And he hath now gained his wish: whether honestly or not can only depend upon whether thou art still alive. At the first he affected to sorrow over thine absence, speaking of thee as "Lord Champernoun" and "his lordship, my dear nephew", and the like. But on a day in the month of May he returned from Plymouth town in great haste and seeming grief, and when his wife, Donna Lela, besought him to tell her wherefore he wore a so doleful countenance, he produced a letter. "'Tis for this that I mourn," said he with a great sorrowful sigh, as he handed the letter to our mother. "'Tis a letter newly come from Sir Richard Grenville," said he. "Read it, good my sister, and God give thee strength to bear its terrible news." And ere mother had read beyond a dozen of the written lines she uttered a scream that might have been heard in the buttery, and fell back in her chair crying, "Oh! my son, my dear son! dead! dead! dead!" And Christopher Pym, seeing that her eyes were flooded with tears ere yet she would read the letter to its end, rose from the supper-table where we all were, and, said he, "I pray you, my lady, let me read you the letter;" and she gave it unto him, and he read it aloud so that all could hear. It told of a great storm that my lord Thomas Howard his fleet had encountered in the Bay of Biscay, and of how the "Revenge" in particular had been sorely buffeted by the mountainous waves, and of how one great wave, sweeping over her decks, had carried off many gallant men, and among them Master Gilbert Oglander.

When Master Pym came to the end and read the name of Richard Grenville, his eyes darted across the table to Jasper Oglander, and the look that Jasper returned to him was dreadful to behold. Master Pym with no more ado went round to where Jasper sat and touched him on the shoulder, and presently Jasper rose and they quitted the room together. We knew not what their intent might be, but 'tis certain that they quarrelled, and 'tis certain that from that day to this good Master Christopher Pym hath never set foot in Modbury Manor.

Now it was not many days thereafter that Jasper began to show by his bearing the thing that was in his mind. He bade all the servants and household address him and speak of him as "my lord", he signed his letters "Champernoun", and if Parliament had been in session, I doubt not that he would have hastened to take his seat in the House of Peers. He gave orders for many changes in the manor-house, he commanded the foresters to hew down our best and bravest oak-trees in the park, and he sold the timber to the shipwrights with which to build ships withal. But more unhappy than all else was his overbearing manner towards our mother. He treated her as though she had no right to remain under the roof, and his Papist wife, whom (as Master Pym hath told me) he had brought over from some hovel in Honduras, was thrust into our mother's place as Lady Champernoun.

Thou canst well understand, dear my brother, how grieved was our mother at all this. She lingered not longer in the place than was barely needful to gather her own personal possessions together, and then, carrying me with her, she set off to Willoughby Grange, where we now are.

'Twas but this morning (as I have said) that Master Christopher Pym came hither with word that the "Barbara Jane" is about to sail for the Azores. He hath spoken long and earnestly with our mother, and she is so sorely distressed that she hath bidden me do what she had willingly have done with her own hand—write to thee, in the hope that thou art still alive, and tell thee of these things. And what hath given her a strong hope is, that Christopher Pym doth now positively declare that the letter which Jasper averred had come to him from Sir Richard Grenville came not from Sir Richard at all, but was a base and wilful forgery.

Much more have I to tell thee. But I have already spent many hours over this long letter, which hath yet to be read by our mother and writ out again by Master Pym, who will set it forth in more seemly English than I, an ignorant girl, can command.

Farewell, dear my brother. The Lord bless thee and bring thee home in safety, and govern thee with His grace and make thee a good servant to our Queen and country. Thy loving sister, so long as thou livest in the fear of God,

DRUSILLA OGLANDER.

Grasping the letter in his hand, Gilbert bent forward with his head upon his knees and wept.

Long, long he remained thus, now weeping in sorrow for his mother, now yearning to be back in England, now fretting over the fate that kept him, as it were, a prisoner on foreign shores. Oh, why were the Spanish so long in coming? Why did they delay?

Suddenly he was aroused by hearing strange sounds: the tinkling of distant bells, the shrill, penetrating whistle of boatswains' pipes, and then the loud report of a cannon. He stood up and glanced through the foliage down at the fleet, and there he saw that the ships were in unwonted commotion. Boats were passing to and fro along the line. Near to the admiral's flag-ship there was a strange vessel with fresh white sails that had been newly furled. It was the same ship that he had already seen making her way across the sea. He turned and glanced over the water to make sure that this was so, for he could not well believe that she had come so quickly, or that he had remained inactive so long, brooding over the letter. Yes, it was indeed the same ship.

But what was this that he now saw upon the far horizon? He strained his eyes in eagerness. Away in the east, like a string of threaded beads upon the line of the horizon, there appeared a whole armada of ships—ten, twenty, forty, nay, more even than this. And they were sailing westward towards Flores—westward from Spain!

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CHAPTER XIX.

A SPLENDID DISOBEDIENCE.

GILBERT came down upon the beach at the spot where the men of the Defiance and the Bonaventure were encamped. Sir Robert Cross and Sir Richard Grenville had come ashore, and their voices sounded loud and re-echoed among the rocks as they issued orders to the men to carry the invalids down to the boats and hasten on board. All was bustle, noise, and confusion. Here a stalwart man of Devon had shouldered one of his sick shipmates and was carrying him over the shingle, here others were rolling down water-breakers that had been left from the early morning, and others again carrying bedding and tent-poles, with their wrappings of ropes and sail-cloth.

The first person whom Gilbert recognised in the crowd was Timothy Trollope.

"What means all this commotion, Tim?" he inquired. "Is't the treasure-ships in sight?"

"No such good luck," answered Tim, looking up from his work of lifting one of the admiral's men upon his shoulder. "Here, I pray you, lend me a hand, Master Gilbert, and I'll tell you as we carry this poor fellow to his boat."

Gilbert took the man's legs in his arms while Timothy laid hold of him by his body, and as they bore him downward over the rough beach Tim said:

"Didst thou not see the coming of the ship, then?"

"I indeed saw a little ship approach," returned Gilbert, "but I know not whence she came nor—"

"'Tis Captain Middleton's ship," interrupted Timothy. "Captain Middleton's ship come hence from Spain to give the alarm that full half a hundred of King Philip's warships are even now bearing down upon us with intent to do battle!"

"I have seen them. I saw them from the heights," declared Gilbert. And then questioning Timothy further he learned that Captain Middleton had been one of the Earl of Cumberland's fleet, that he had had a race with the galleons and had outstripped them by only a few hours' sail. He had counted three-and-fifty galleons—the best that Spain possessed, and it seemed that the King of Spain, knowing of Lord Thomas Howard's presence and intention at the Azores, had sent out this formidable fleet to frustrate his foes and protect his treasure-ships against the English.

The news had come upon Lord Thomas Howard like a thunder-clap, when he was all unprepared for the emergency. As we have seen, more than half the crew in every ship were away on shore, lying sick, while a large part of the remainder were busy collecting ballast and getting water. On board most of the ships only a few officers and ship-keepers were left. Yet taken by surprise as they were, the captains were now meeting the perilous situation with a prompt alacrity worthy of the navy of which they were proud to form a part. Sir Richard Grenville as vice-admiral had hastened ashore, knowing that it was his duty to remain behind with his ship until the last man was on board. He now gave his orders calmly and with no show of hurry, and when he had seen the men of the flag-ship well in the way of getting on board, he passed on along the beach to where those of the Bonaventure were preparing to quit their temporary dwelling-place. In like manner he saw to the men of Captain Fenner's Lion, Captain Vavasour's Foresight, Captain Duffield's Crane, and to those of the Bark Raleigh, the Pilgrim, the George Noble, and the other smaller ships. Lastly, he came to his own men of the Revenge, and when these had been sent on board he again made his way along the beach to pick up all the possible stragglers. This work occupied him little more than half an hour, for all knew what was at stake, and each man had taken his own duty in hand with ready promptitude.

The first alarm-gun had been fired at one o'clock. By two o'clock five of the six men-of-war and all the victuallers, flyboats, and pinnaces had slipped their cables or weighed their anchors, had shaken out their sails and were beginning to work out seaward for an offing.

While Sir Richard Grenville was on shore the admiral himself had not been idle. It was too late now to think of ballasting his ships, which were all too light by reason of having been emptied of all the old and infected ballast that they had brought in them from England; but he knew that more than half his forces were sick and useless for the work of battle, that on the Bonaventure, his largest ship, there were not so many men in health as could handle her mainsail, so he ordered that a score of the best should be transferred to her from the ship that Sir George Cary had sent out with the expedition, while Sir George Cary's ship was at the last moment scuttled and left to go to the bottom.

Lord Thomas Howard signalled his orders to his little fleet, and his own ship, the Defiance, led the way out into the offing, for the Spanish galleons were already approaching the nearest headland of the island and he deemed it wise to escape as speedily as he could. He saw that the Revenge had not yet weighed anchor, and he signalled to her yet again, intending that Grenville should loiter no longer, but that, whatever her condition or the condition of the few men still remaining ashore, she should at once slip her cable and follow in her appointed place at the rear.

Sir Richard Grenville saw the signal, but thinking only of the sick men in his charge he would not start until he had collected and shipped the last of his crew, who, if he had left them on shore, must have been lost.

"We cannot leave the poor fellows here to die," said he to Timothy Trollope, who had been with him during this time helping the men into the boats. "It were surely cowardly to abandon them. Heave yourself up on my back, lad," he added, speaking to Red Bob, who was now the last remaining man. "There is yet time if we are but quick." And with Timothy's help he carried Bob down to the boat, and then they were rowed out to the Revenge.

Then with every man safe on board he at last weighed. At the same instant as the dripping anchor came to the bows, the tall masts with their bellying sails and the towering hulls of the two vanguard squadrons of the Spanish fleet appeared under the headland. On the galleons swept to the windward of the Revenge, with their ports triced up and the gun muzzles showing, and the brass patereros glittering in the afternoon sun.

Sir Richard, standing, as it seemed, quite unconcerned upon his quarter-deck, took in the position in which he was placed. To the windward of him were the fifty-three great galleons of Spain. On his lee, now drawing wind and sailing quickly into safety, were the ships of Lord Thomas Howard. Grenville was not a trained seaman, and he knew but few of the mariner's tricks and tactics, but he understood his present case well enough to know that his best and only chance of safety was to 'bout ship and run for it in the endeavour to weather the leaders of the Spaniards.

He cast a moment's glance at his sailing-master and in turn at Captain Robinson, who stood near him.

"It seemeth to me," remarked the master, "that we have lingered over long."

"Ay," added Captain Robinson. "The delay hath cost Her Majesty her goodliest ship and us our lives and our long-cherished honour."

"How so?" questioned Grenville, in the blunt direct tone which signified his inward excitement.

Captain Robinson raised his eyebrows in slight surprise, and his fingers played with the point of his well-trimmed black beard.

"Why," answered he in a seemingly careless tone, "methinks we are caught in a very pretty trap, that is all." And then a new and earnest light flashing in his beautiful blue eyes, he added: "Look you, Sir Richard, we have but one way only. Let out your mainsail, sir, and cast about, and trust to the sailing of the ship. She is ill-conditioned, 'tis true; but 'twill go ill if we cannot even yet escape and join our squadron."

Sir Richard Grenville regarded him with a stern determined glance.

"What!" he cried. And then he laughed, and in a softer voice added: "No, no. I never yet turned tail on devil or Don, nor will I do so now. Rather would I die this day than dishonour myself, my country, or Her Majesty's ship!" He strode slowly across the deck and as slowly returned. Then he looked out over the rail at the approaching galleons. They now appeared in two well-ordered squadrons on his weather-bow, sailing down upon him between the two neighbour islands of Flores and Corvo. "Truly they are a brave sight," he went on, "as gallant a sight as mine eyes have rested upon these three years agone. But, mark you, Master Robinson, I mean not to fly from them, not I. 'Tis one against fifty-three, but, by thunder, I mean to adventure it! In despite of their so great strength I intend to pass in betwixt those two squadrons and force them to give me way!"

"Nay, 'tis impossible; 'twere rank madness to make the attempt," cried the master. "Sure 'tis no dishonour to fly before such overwhelming numbers. Cast about, sir, while yet there is time. Believe me, 'tis the better course."

But Sir Richard Grenville would not be persuaded, and the word was passed aft to the steersman to take the ship in between the two lines of galleons.

It was at this moment that Gilbert Oglander showed himself before his chief. He was about to ask some question, but Sir Richard cut him short.

"Bring me my casque, boy, and my breastplates and tassets, also my best sword!" Then to the master he added: "Let beat the men to their fighting quarters. Run out the guns, and let every one be manned by a brave son of Devon that will stick to his post while there be powder to shoot and ships to be shot."

None on board had expected this order. All were appalled by Sir Richard's boldness. But when once the word had gone forth that there was fighting to be done, there was not a man or a boy whose bodily health permitted him who did not fly to his particular post with joy at the thought of having it out with the hated Spaniards.

Already the Revenge was drifting onward to meet her foes. With her hundred eager fighting-men on her decks, and her ninety sick lying unserviceable on the ballast, she slowly made her way into the narrow channel between the oncoming galleons. The first four of them, either awed by her boldness or else not quite prepared, permitted her to pass, but immediately "sprang their luff" and fell under her lee, where they contented themselves with firing a few shots into one of the English victualling ships, the George Noble, of London, that with greater spirit than might have been expected of so small a craft, had detached herself from Her Majesty's ships and fallen behind to offer aid to the hard-pressed Revenge. Her captain, scorning the few shots that had rattled through his shrouds, now brought her under the Revenge's counter and called out to Sir Richard Grenville, asking him for commands.

"Nay, seek no commands of me," cried Grenville in reply. "But save yourself, in God's name, while there be time. As for me, why, prithee, leave me to my fortune. I can look after myself if any man can."

At this moment occurred the catastrophe which Captain Robinson and the sailing-master had clearly foreseen. The great galleon, San Philip, being to the windward of the Revenge, and coming speedily towards her, becalmed her sails, which flapped loose, flattened against her masts, hung down, and ceased to draw. The Revenge lost the way that was upon her, and she could neither move onward nor obey her helm. The San Philip was a huge and high-charged ship of fifteen hundred tons—three times the burden of the Revenge,—carrying three tiers of ordnance on a side, and eleven pieces in every tier. She had eight great guns peeping out of her chase-ports, and from these she belched forth a volley of cross-bar shot that crashed into Grenville's gallant little ship, making her tremble in every plank, yet doing but slight mischief. And at the same time the three galleons that were to his leeward luffed up, and fired their forward guns into his rigging. These ships were all high in the hull, and their guns were so trained that the shots passed over the Revenge's upper bulwarks, only severing a few ropes or clipping some splinters of timber from off her masts and yards. One of the nearest galleons was the admiral, or flag-ship, of the Biscayan squadron, a very mighty and powerful vessel, commanded by the great Spanish warrior Britandona.

Gilbert Oglander, as he strode towards the companion stairs after having helped Sir Richard Grenville to don his body armour, glanced round at the vast fleet of the enemy. Each galleon's decks and fighting-tops were crowded with soldiers, whose morions and breastplates glistened in the afternoon sun. On the San Philip's decks there were, as he afterwards estimated, no fewer than six or seven hundred soldiers, apart from her seamen, and the others of the Spanish ships must certainly have been equally well manned; while on the Revenge there were no fighting-men beside the mariners, excepting only the servants of her officers and some few gentlemen volunteers like himself.

Already the dread sounds of battle greeted Gilbert's unaccustomed ears. The loud rumbling roar of the cannons coming from the lumbering hulls below was mingled with the sharp crackling of musketry from above, where the Spaniards posted in the tops were firing in the hope of picking off some of the English officers. The air was even at this early time charged with a faint smell of burnt gunpowder. Gilbert did not pause to watch the opening of the battle, but hastened down to the main-deck, where, for the present, he was to occupy himself in helping the gunners and carrying out the powder from the magazines.

Here, down below, he found Edward Webbe with his lighted lintlock coolly glancing outward along the barrel of a great brass gun. There was no need to take careful aim, for wheresoever the cannon might be fired its contents of heavy shot were certain to strike into the oaken hull of one of the galleons. Webbe applied his fuse, and the cannon flung forth its spurt of fire with a thunderous boom that made the very deck shake and the strained lashings creak. Along the whole space of the 'tween decks and at both sides the gunners applied themselves to their work with quiet and unruffled movements, and presently Edward Webbe gave up his gun to another man and undertook the task of directing his shipmates in the work, only peering out now and again through one of the portholes to watch the movements of the enemy, as galleon after galleon came within close range.

"Steady, my lads!" he cried, "and take good aim. Waste not a shot, but mark well where it must find its home. Lower your gun's muzzle, Matthew Giles," he said to one who was training his piece to fire against the walls of one of the nearer galleons. "Take her below the water-line, and sink her."

It was the great San Philip that was alongside now. Having blocked out the breeze from the Revenge's sails by her own vast stretch of canvas, she had forced herself full into the path of the English man-of-war, and swung herself round broadside to broadside, with her grapplings ready to hold her intended victim fast and so overpower her by superior strength, and riddle her with shot until she should sink. This was just at three o'clock in the afternoon, and forthwith the terrible and memorable combat was begun in desperate earnest.

At the same time four other of the most formidable of the Spanish galleons—the smallest of them double the size of the Revenge—drew out to support the San Philip, and took up positions round Sir Richard Grenville's ship, two on her larboard side, one astern of her, and the fourth under her bows. And all five assailed her with a storm of iron shot and heavy stone balls and langrage and cross-bar shot. The noise of the discharge of so many guns was deafening to hear. But it was seen that the greater number of the shots passed over her, so low in the hull was she compared with the towering height of her enemies. Nevertheless many a shot buried itself in her stout sides, many crashed through her bulwarks, cut great pieces out of her masts, and tore her sails and rigging. But her gallant flag of St George waved gloriously on high; her men stuck to their work with ever-ripening courage, and small though she was in the midst of her huge foes, she dealt them as much as they gave: nay, even more than that, for she had British guns on board of her and British men to fire them, and never a shot did they fire that did not tell.

After the interchange of many volleys of great ordnance and small-shot, the Spaniards, finding that the Revenge still held her ground and defended herself with so great determination, made an attempt to board her, hoping to force her by the sheer multitude of their armed soldiers and musketeers. The great San Philip drew to close quarters. Her bulging sides crunched against those of the Revenge, and a host of her men clambered over her rails, pike and sword in hand, climbed into the Revenge's lower shrouds, and swarmed like so many infuriated bees along her stout bulwarks at every point. But Ambrose Pennington, who had control of the murderer-gun on the starboard side of Sir Richard's quarter-deck, was ready at the moment with his fuse. He fired the gun, and its scattering charge of small-shot played fearful havoc among the would-be boarders, while those who escaped the destructive fire fell either back between the ships or forward upon the deck of the Revenge, where they were speedily overpowered.

Nor were the gunners below decks unmindful of their opportunity. At the moment when the Spaniards were in the act of boarding, Edward Webbe had every gun on his starboard side ready loaded with cross-bar shot and primed. He gave the order, and his men applied their lintlocks, and the full broadside was discharged straight into the San Philip's hull. After this she sheered off with all diligence from her too close position, "utterly misliking her first entertainment". It was said afterwards that the galleon foundered, but Sir Walter Raleigh in his written account of the fight cast doubt upon the point. Howbeit, no sooner had the San Philip been cleared away than her position was taken up by yet another galleon, only to be beaten off in like manner. One after another they closed and boarded, one after another they were flung back beaten and in confusion, their boarders being repulsed again and again, taking refuge in their own ships or else falling into the seas.

To tell every incident of this terrible battle would make a long story, albeit the valour displayed by our English seamen on that great occasion has no more glorious example in all the annals of our navy's history. Hour after hour went by and still the Revenge fought on with undaunted courage. Many of her men were slain and many were hurt, and her surgeons and their assistants were busy in the hold. Yet the Spaniards suffered more. Early in the fight Don Louis Cutino, one of the admirals of Seville, brought his galleon alongside in all her bravery, but he had not fought for more than a quarter of an hour ere a broadside from the Revenge was fired point blank into his vessel's hull, sinking her with all on board. And the same fate befell the powerful galleon, the Ascension, of Seville, commanded by the Marquis of Arumburch. One other galleon, sorely beaten, had yet strength to recover the roadstead of the island of St. Michaels, where she quickly followed her anchor to the bottom. A fourth, to save her men, was run aground on Flores.

All through that hot August afternoon the Revenge fought on, and as each galleon was driven off another pushed in to relieve her beaten consort and to renew the attack upon the stubborn little English man-of-war, who withstood it all with her hundred men on board, resisting all comers. With never fewer than two mighty galleons by her side, she fought to the death, single-handed.

The Spaniards had an unlimited reserve. They could not all hope to empty their guns into their heroic little foe, but they crowded round, ever near, to supply the attacking ships when needed with fresh soldiers, all manner of arms, and with powder and shot in plenty. To the Revenge there remained no such comfort, no supply of either ships or men or weapons, and, alas! no hope.

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CHAPTER XX.

THE LAST FIGHT OF THE "REVENGE".

ONCE, indeed, in the course of the fight, an English ship appeared, brave and willing to offer her small help.

Towards sunset, during a momentary lull in the storm of battle, while one of the broken and battered Spanish ships was being cleared away from the ceaseless fury of the English guns, Jacob Hartop left the little brass falcon gun on the forecastle, at which he had stood for four terrible hours, and went down for a drink of water. A musket-shot had struck him in the thigh, and he was somewhat faint. He limped within the doorway of the seamen's quarters. A dozen men were in this shelter, some binding up their wounds, some resting and gathering breath before going out again upon the decks, others patiently waiting for their turn with the water-dipper.

Jacob's eyes surveyed them, passing slowly from one face to another. He nodded to one, gave a cheering smile to another, and helped a third to tie a knot in the kerchief which he was binding over his arm.

"What say you, my masters?" said he. "This be life, eh? This be tasting glory!"

"Ah—h!" breathed Jeff Dimsdale, the man who was taking the dipper from young Robin Redfern. "'Tis such glory as might fill many of our friends at home with envy. May I taste more on't ere I be like Tom Wilson that's down below on the ballast with a bullet in his honest heart!" He raised the water to his pale lips. "Tom would ha' given a deal for this drop o' water, I reckon," he said. Then, still hesitating to drink, he added: "Here's to Queen Bess, God bless her!"

Drinking the water at one long draught, he silently handed the dipper back to Robin and passed out into the open.

"'Tis men such as Jeff that have won England her glory on the main," declared Hartop, as he watched the man striding along the deck. Even as his eyes rested upon him, he saw Dimsdale stagger and fall, with an arrow, fired from the tops of one of the Spaniards, piercing his temple. A youth, hastening forward, stumbled over the fallen man, rose to his feet, looked into Dimsdale's face and passed on. The youth was Gilbert Oglander, who with grimy, powder-stained countenance, had come up on deck, utterly tired out by his hard work below. He entered the forecastle and waited his turn for a drink of water.

"What, art stationed below decks, Master Oglander?" questioned Jacob Hartop. "Methinks your better place were up here where there be boarders to repel. There be many who can carry powder on board, but few who have the skill to wield a sword or shoot an arrow as thou hast, my master."

"In truth, 'twas that very thought that brought me hither," said Gilbert. "And with the more reason, in that the powder is not now so plentiful or the gunners so many that those I have left below cannot be quickly enough served by the ship's boys. Hast seen aught of Timothy Trollope, Master Hartop?"

Jacob shook his head, but Robin Redfern, hearing the question, answered, as he pointed outward along the upper deck to where, under the larboard bulwarks, a half-dozen of Sir Richard Grenville's men were fighting amid a clash of arms with some score of Spaniards who had made an entrance upon the Revenge:

"So please you, sir, he is yonder, where, as I have seen with my own eyes, he hath slain a full dozen Spaniards."

Without waiting for his much-needed drink of water, Gilbert snatched up a morion that lay at his feet, clapped it upon his bare head, unsheathed his sword, and ran out to join in the fray. Jacob Hartop, smiling at the lad's impetuous eagerness, turned to the water-butt and took the proffered dipper from Robin Redfern's hand.

Robin's face was very pale, and there was a strange light in his grave, gray eyes. He glanced quickly round the cabin, and presently darted into the further corner, went down upon his knees in the dark, and after a moment emerged gripping a little sword in his right hand, and strode to the door. Jacob Hartop stretched out his hand to stop the boy, guessing his purpose, but Robin escaped him and ran out, mingling with the fighting crowd.

Very soon afterwards Hartop was again at his gun on the starboard side of the forecastle deck. At the moment there was a slight lull in the battle. A galleon that had been grappled to this side of the Revenge for an hour or more, and was now almost a total wreck, was being drawn off to give place to a mighty ship which had stood by from the time of the opening of the battle, and whose decks were crowded with soldiers. Glancing out through the gap thus made, Hartop saw at some distance away a little ship flying the flag of St. George. She seemed to be hovering near, either to see the success of the fight, or else, which was more probable, to do what she might to rescue the Revenge from the grip of her overpowering enemies. Hartop knew the little ship. He had seen her many times during the voyage out from England and also at the anchorage at Flores. It was Jacob Whiddon's Pilgrim.

The great galleon which now closed in to the attack was the St. Paul, the flag-ship of Don Alonzo de Bassan, a brother of the renowned Marquis of Santa Cruz, and King Philip's chosen admiral. Already the Revenge's bowsprit had been shot away, her foremast had fallen by the board, and her main topmast was lying across her main-deck with two Englishmen and seven Spaniards crashed under its weight. Her sails were in ribbons, and her riggings were in a hopeless tangle of broken rope; her bulwarks had great yawning gaps in them, yet still her gallant flag waved gloriously, albeit with many shot-holes in it, over her poop. And now the St. Paul opened fire upon her, first from her chase-guns that shot out their great stone balls, and then, as she swung round, from her full broadside. Sir Richard Granville's mizzen-mast, which had beforetime been sorely hacked and splintered, fell with a crash. And now she lay heaving lazily on the swell of the ocean, with but the ragged stumps of her three masts showing above the level of her shattered hull, and her ship's company in their sadly reduced numbers showing still a sturdy and dauntless front, and ever persistently fighting on. The sea round about her was so strewn with wreckage that the galleons could not now come close to her as they had done at the first, but lay round her in a ring, firing into her or sending out their boats crowded with soldiers to board her, the beams of the setting sun shining on their morions and body armour, and glancing on the blades of their drawn swords.

As Don Alonzo's ship hove near, and when the cloud of smoke from her discharged guns had lifted, the archers in her fighting-tops fired down their arrow shafts in the endeavour to pick off such of the English officers as presented themselves on the poop-deck. Sir Richard Grenville was struck many times, but his body armour was well forged, and although he indeed had received many slight wounds on hands and neck and face, yet he was practically unhurt, and his hoarse voice could be heard amid the battle's thunder cheering his men and bidding them fight on.

His son Roland had been wounded by a musket-shot in his right arm, but, like Sir Richard, he cared not so long as he had breath in him to fight; so he took his sword in his left hand, and ever when any Spaniards attempted to make an entrance upon the decks he was ready to repel them, with Timothy Trollope and Gilbert Oglander shoulder to shoulder with him, forming a human barrier through which no Don, howsoever bold, might pass.

Gilbert Oglander became conscious that as Don Alonzo's galleon came near, there was one archer in her mizzen-top who had, as it seemed, singled him out from among his companions. Arrow after arrow struck with a sharp ring upon his breastplate; and as he moved along the deck to encounter new foes, again and again an arrow would buzz past him, always from the same direction.

The Spaniards, secure in the knowledge that the Revenge was helpless, went about the fighting more slowly as evening drew upon them. It was as if they thought to prolong their victim's life, and wished only to see for how much time the little Revenge would hold out against them. During a lull in the fight Sir Richard Grenville ordered his men to clear the decks of wreckage, and to cast overboard the bodies of the slain. Water was served round, together with bread and onions. As Gilbert Oglander was carrying a flagon of water to one of his wounded comrades who lay in the scuppers, an arrow struck the flagon and dashed it from his grasp. He picked the empty vessel up and returned to the water-butt to refill it. Again as he passed aft an arrow struck him, this time making a deep dent in his morion. And at that moment young Robin Redfern, with a kerchief bound round his bleeding head, came up to him and touched him on the arm.

"Master," the lad cried, "I pray you have a care how you expose yourself to the aim of the archer who hath just fired at you. His arrows have pursued you this long while past. And—and—prithee, Master Gilbert, dost know who 'tis?"

"Nay, how should I know one Spaniard from another?" Gilbert asked, passing on towards the wounded man. But Robin held him.

"Hark you, my master," cried the lad, "I have seen his face. I saw it but a few moments ago, and, as I live, 'tis the face of your own cousin, Master Philip Oglander!"

Now Gilbert, despite the excitement of the battle had not forgotten Drusilla's letter that was nestling within his doublet under the protection of his breastplate. His thoughts had gone more than once to his home and to the remembrance of his uncle's trickery, and this had increased by an hundredfold his hatred of all friends of Spain, and he had fought with a spirit of personal vengeance as well as with the desire to help his fellow-countrymen and his Queen in this battle against their dread enemy. For an instant he doubted the truth of what Robin had told him, and when he had served the wounded man with his drink of water, and helped him down to the crowded cockpit, he looked out through one of the portholes in search of his cousin in the galleon's tops. But the place where his enemy had stood was now cleared of men, and Philip Oglander was nowhere to be seen.

As he was mounting the ladder-stairs to regain the deck, he came upon a man climbing painfully upward with a sword between his teeth. Putting his arm about the man's body to assist him, he said:

"Art wounded, my master?"

The man looked round at him. It was Red Bob.

"Not I," he answered. "But I can no longer lie and listen to the groans of my friends down there, nor to the booming of the guns, and think that, ill though I am, I have not yet fired a shot or drawn a weapon in defence of this good ship. A score of the sick men have already gone up to fight, Master Oglander, and 'tis my intention to join them, and do what little I can."

"May the good God put strength into your arm, then!" returned Gilbert, and, stepping upon the deck, he drew the man with him, and gave him a loaded pistol and a bag of powder and shot. Jacob Hartop encountered them as they moved aft.

"My good gun hath been dismounted at last," said he. "Yet 'tis of little account, methinks, for I do hear that the powder hath well-nigh given out." A cheer from the after-deck broke in upon his words. "Ah, here be work for us!" he added, snatching his sword from his side and limping towards the quarter-deck, followed by Gilbert and Red Bob.

A boat-load of Spanish soldiers had put out from the admiral's galleon, and had come alongside the Revenge. Fresh and eager they clambered up from her chains and over her broken bulwarks—two score of them at the least. Sir Richard Grenville and Captain Robinson rallied their men to their sides. They quickly drew together in a line, a gallant little company of twelve, not one of whom was without a wound, saving three who had come up from their hard beds on the ballast, and these were so weak that it was a labour even to raise their swords.

They met their foes with a rattle of pistol-shots and then with a clash of steel. Sir Richard Grenville closed with a tall Don, whose gay clothing and sparkling rings proclaimed him a man of consequence. Whatever Grenville may have been as a seamen, he was certainly no mean swordsman. He parried the Spaniard's fierce thrust, and with a quick movement of his strong wrist and an alert lunge forward sent the point of his weapon deep into the other's bare throat. The Spaniard fell, and Sir Richard stepped over his inert body to encounter the man who had taken his leader's place. Four Spaniards did he vanquish with his own hand within the few minutes during which this engagement on his quarter-deck lasted. And by his side—the least with the greatest—fought little Robin Redfern.

Robin, indeed, seemed to have abandoned all sense of fear or thought of danger, and he fought valiantly in his own boyish fashion. At one moment he rushed forward into the very midst of the Spaniards, and engaged hand to hand with one whom he seemed to have singled out. Gilbert, seeing him thus expose himself, pressed in to his rescue, caught him by the shoulder and dragged him back, parrying on his own blade the sword-thrust that must else have ended the boy's life. Gilbert now crossed swords with Robin's antagonist, and in the fading evening light caught sight of his face, recognizing it as the face of his own cousin, Philip. For a moment Gilbert drew back, appalled at the thought of fighting with one of his own flesh and blood. But Philip, with a scornful laugh on his lips, pressed him to the duel. It was thrust and cut and parry, parry and cut and thrust, for many moments. The two were equally matched in skill, albeit Gilbert had already been fighting for five hours without a rest, while his cousin was full fresh and active. Back and ever back, foot by foot, Gilbert was forced, and at last a fierce thrust delivered with all the strength in Philip's right arm, backed by all the weight in his body, brought Gilbert to his knees. The sword's point struck against his breast-plate, doing no real injury, but by its sheer force it disturbed his balance. He rolled over on the deck, and his own weapon fell from his hand.

THE GREAT FIGHT ON BOARD THE REVENGE

"Now will I do for thee at last!" cried Philip Oglander savagely between his teeth, speaking in English. He held his sword in air for a moment as if in deliberation where to strike. In that moment his weapon hand was struck a tremendous blow by a pistol flung at it by Red Bob, and Red Bob himself sprang forward, crying "Traitorous hound! I know ye!" and clutched him round the body in a wrestling embrace. The two swayed to and fro for an instant, and then Red Bob dropped on the deck with Philip Oglander's dagger in his heart.

When Gilbert rose to his feet to continue the duel with his cousin he saw Philip climbing back over the bulwark in haste to regain the galleon's boat. Others of the Spaniards occupied Gilbert now, and Ambrose Pennington and one of the yeomen of the sheets coming up to help, they were soon overpowered or driven over the side. Some fell into the sea; five-and-twenty of them had been slain; and the boat returned to Don Alonzo's ship with but seven out of the fortymen who had set out in her, less than half an hour earlier.

Darkness had now spread across the sea, the stars peeped out through the overhanging mist of smoke, and in a wide ring about the Revenge the galleons stood, ceaselessly firing upon her. Their guns flashed out their fire into the black night. Many of the shots flew wide; some passed over the low-lying wreck and struck the galleons lying beyond, yet many thundered against the sides of the English ship, burying themselves in her stout timbers or rebounding with a hiss into the sea. Hour after hour throughout the night the battle continued, and if not many of Sir Richard Grenville's men were killed or wounded it was because so few remained alive to be wounded or killed. An hour before midnight there were but a dozen men and boys at Sir Richard's side upon his decks, and these were all so weary and bruised and hungry that they scarce could stand. Yet they hovered about their chief, seldom speaking, but only exchanging strange glances one with another, binding up each other's hurts, or gazing about them at the flashing of the cannon. At times one would take up a musket, and, if he could find powder and shot wherewith to load it, would fire into a crowd of soldiers upon one of the Spaniard's decks.

Sir Richard strode to and fro, sword in hand, with a staggering gait, now pausing behind the shelter of some yet unbroken piece of bulwark and watching the movements of the enemy. And once he caught at Gilbert Oglander's arm, gripping it tightly as though to support himself.

"I pray thee tell me, Sir Richard," cried the lad. "Art wounded? Wilt go below to the cabin?"

"Nay, nay," returned Grenville quickly, breathing hard nevertheless, "I would but ask thee to hasten below and discover wherefore our guns be silent. Od's life, boy, must we lie here and not give them shot for shot! Go, bid the gunners maintain their firing!"

And Gilbert obeyed, coming back some minutes afterwards, saying:

"Good my master, the last barrel of powder hath been broached, and there is scarce enough for another round."

Then Sir Richard took off the casque from his head and wiped his brow, answering:

"Go below yet again and bid them sweep up the boards of the magazine, and scrape out a handful of powder wheresoever it may be found. And you, boy," he added to young Robin Redfern, who stood trembling near him under the light of one of the deck lanterns, "hie you to one of the water-butts and bring me a drink of water."

His voice was weak, and Ambrose Pennington, who had seated himself on the thick end of a dismounted cannon, heard it and quickly rose to his feet.

"Y'are hurt, Sir Richard," said he. "I know it, though you do bear it so bravely. I beg you let me help you to your cabin, where the surgeon will attend you."

Sir Richard shook his head.

"Wherefore should I leave the deck now," said he,—"now when there be so few to defend it?"

"Nay, I implore you," urged Pennington, and putting his arm about the admiral's body he gently drew him towards the stairs. And Grenville went with him. The surgeon was brought, and he speedily took off Sir Richard's body-armour, and laid bare the many wounds that he had received. These he washed and bound up with bandages. The two stood under a little hanging lamp that was near the open porthole. Their movements, or their flitting shadows, must have been observed upon one of the galleons, for even as they were nearly ready to quit the cabin a musket-shot struck Sir Richard on his shoulder. A second bullet struck him on the head, and at the same moment a third shot killed the surgeon at his side.

Taking up a fragment of linen Sir Richard bound it about his head and staggered to the door. Severe as his injuries were, it was not in him to stand aside in the hour of peril. He crept up to the deck. At the top of the stairs he was met by Robin Redfern, who had patiently stood there with the flagon of water that he had been sent for.

"God bless thee, my lad!" said Sir Richard, taking the cup from the boy's hand. "And may you live to serve your Queen and country as I have tried to serve them!"

The words had but left his lips when a cannon-ball whizzed past him. He turned to look for the boy, and found Robin lying dead at his feet. Then a full broadside of his own ship's guns was fired.

"Fight on! Fight on!" he cried, although indeed none was near him to hear his encouraging words.

That was the last discharge of his heavy guns; for now there was not sufficient powder on board with which to fire them, and even the smaller cannons, the falconets and demi-culverins, could be but sparingly used. Yet so long as there was a handful of powder to be found it was carefully employed. Not only had the ammunition run short, but all the pikes were broken in hand-to-hand fight, and of Grenville's men that had gone into action forty lay dead, and the most part of the rest severely wounded. The ship herself was almost a wreck, her tackle all cut asunder, her upper works altogether rased. During the fifteen hours, from three o'clock in the afternoon, when the battle had begun, until daybreak on the next morning, she had been closely assailed by fifteen several galleons, in addition to those that had fired upon her from a distance.

Just before dawn, Edward Webbe and the few remaining gunners who had been at work between decks appeared above the hatchway. They had used up the powder to the last grain, and there was no more fighting to be done. Webbe was as black as a coalman, his clothing was torn to tatters, and he was covered with wounds. He went up to Captain Robinson and told him the condition of the ship. The captain then held colloquy with the sailing-master, and both approached Sir Richard Grenville.

"Our powder hath been spent, even to the last corn," said the captain.

"We have six feet of water in the hold," added the sailing-master, "and three great shot-holes below the water-line which are so weakly plugged that with the first working of the sea we must needs sink."

Sir Richard Grenville took a turn to and fro, meditating. Then he looked at the master-gunner, whom he knew to be a most resolute man, and said in a tone of command:

"Blow up the ship, then! Blow her up! Split her and sink her, that naught may remain of glory or victory to our enemies. As for ourselves, let us yield ourselves unto God, and to the mercy of none else!"

"Nay," returned the master. "Have we not told ye that there is no gunpowder on board wherewith to fire a gun, much less to blow up the ship?"

"Why, then," cried Grenville, "split her up with your hatchets, pull out the plugs from the shot-holes. But sink her, sink her how you will. For while we have, like valiant men, repulsed so many of our enemies, it were folly now to shorten the honour of our nation by prolonging our lives for a few hours or a few days. So let sink her, I say. Sink her, in God's name."

To this Edward Webbe and divers others who were with him readily assented. But Captain Robinson and Pennington were of another opinion, and they besought Sir Richard to have care of them, declaring that the Spaniards would doubtless be as ready to accept a composition as they themselves were ready to offer the same. "There be many able and valiant men in our company yet living," said the captain, "whose wounds are not mortal, and who may yet do their country and Queen acceptable service hereafter."

But Sir Richard refused to hearken to this pleading, and he moved away and stood for a while looking over the sea that was now clearer under the approaching light of dawn. And beyond the galleons he caught sight of Jacob Whiddon's ship, the Pilgrim, bearing away to the leeward with two great galleons in pursuit of her.

Meanwhile, Captain Robinson held speech with his fellows and won many of them to his side, and he besought Ambrose Pennington to leave the ship and go on board the St. Paul and parley with Don Alonzo de Bassan for conditions. So Pennington and Jacob Hartop and some three others, all of them sorely wounded and looking strangely ill-conditioned, went down into an empty boat that was alongside, and holding up a white flag in their bow they crossed the intervening space of sea to the admiral.

They found Don Alonzo in no great haste to make another entry upon the Revenge, for his men had had enough of her, and even still feared her. Pennington told him that Sir Richard Grenville had a mind to blow up his ship with himself and all his ship's company.

"And wherefore should he resort to a measure so extreme?" questioned Don Alonzo. "Since his disposition is so dangerous, return to him, I beg you, and let him know that I am willing to put an end to this battle, and that I have already lost more men and more ships than I had ever thought to lose at the hands of one small English man-of-war. Bid him understand that I yield to him his life, and that the lives of all his ship's company shall be spared and sent home to England. For the better sort, such reasonable ransom shall be paid as their estates may bear. But I do aver, and swear by the Holy Mother, that all of you shall be free from the galleys and from imprisonment. I care not to expose myself and my fleet to further loss and mischief. Also, 'tis my great desire to rescue your Sir Richard Grenville, whom for his most notable valour I do greatly honour and admire."

With this answer Pennington returned to the Revenge, and since safety of life was promised, the larger number of the men, feeling themselves to be now at the end of their peril, stood up against Sir Richard and Edward Webbe, and declared their willingness to surrender.

"What!" cried Edward Webbe with bitter scorn and contempt in his voice. "Do you ask me to surrender to a Spaniard? Me who have borne so much of horror and torture and cruelty at their hands, and at the hands of their accursed Inquisition? God forbid! No, I will not surrender. Rather would I die now at this moment where I stand!"

And thus saying he whipped out his sword, and resting its hilt upon the deck, held its point towards his body with intent to throw himself upon it. But the captain arrested him in the act, kicking the sword away. Webbe struggled to regain his weapon, and, failing, was about to rush to the ship's side and fling himself into the sea, when Ambrose Pennington and another caught him and carried him down to his cabin and there locked him in, making sure that he had no weapon within reach.

Sir Richard Grenville stood alone, not attempting to dissuade his men from their resolve, and presently in the silence Jacob Hartop spoke.

"Ned was right," said he, stepping to Sir Richard's side. "An English ship, even though she be a poor battered hulk, were ever a better home than a galleon of Spain." He glanced aft to the flag-staff upon which a tattered remnant of the honoured flag still fluttered in the morning air, and baring his head he added: "God bless Queen Elizabeth!"

Gilbert Oglander and Timothy Trollops had taken no part in this little scene. They were at the time both below in the cockpit attending to their wounds and giving what small help was in their power to their sick and dying companions. Here, too, was Roland Grenville. But in good time the death-like silence of the abated battle brought the three up on deck. As they came to the stair-head they glanced upon the water, which rippled and glanced in the morning light; for there were now no intervening bulwarks to shield it from their sight. And they saw some six gaily-furnished boats approaching. The boats were brought alongside, and the boys at their bows threw up coils of rope as they touched, which, falling upon the blood-stained deck, were taken by certain of Sir Richard's men and secured to such balks of timber as could be found. Then one by one the men stole away into the boats and were taken aboard Don Alonzo's ship and others of the galleons.

Sir Richard Grenville, thus overmatched, agreed after much persuasion to leave the Revenge, which was indeed an unsavoury resting-place for any man, her decks being covered with blood and strewn with the bodies of dead and wounded men, as if it had been a slaughter-house.

"Well, an you will, let it be so," said Sir Richard as he turned to descend into the boat that the Spanish admiral had sent for him. "He may do with my body what he listeth, for I esteem it not." And grasping the hand of Gilbert Oglander, who was helping him, he added, "Pray for me, Gilbert, my lad. And bid the others of our company pray for me also."

Then he swooned, reviving only when he was laid upon a couch in the cabin of one of the Spanish officers on board the St Paul.

Don Alonzo himself would neither see him nor speak with him. But the other captains and gentlemen received him with gracious courtesy, treated him with humanity and kindness, and left nothing unattempted that might contribute to his comfort or tend to his recovery. They wondered at his courage and his stout heart, for he now showed no sign of faintness nor change of colour.

Gilbert Oglander remained at his side throughout that day, and was relieved at night by Sir Richard's son Roland. Early in the morning the galleons anchored in the roadstead of Terceira. Sir Richard Grenville was too weak to be removed upon the island, and Gilbert and Roland sat with him until he died on the morning of the third day after the battle.

His last words were worthy of his life. Two of the Spanish captains were present as he spoke them in their own tongue.

"Here die I, Richard Grenville," he murmured as he held his son's hand. "Here die I, Richard Grenville, with a joyful and quiet mind, for that I have ended my life as a true soldier ought to do that hath fought for his country, Queen, religion, and honour, whereby my soul most joyful departeth out of this body, and shall always leave behind it an everlasting fame of a valiant and true soldier that hath done his duty as he was bound to do."

---

CHAPTER XXI.

PRISONERS AND CAPTIVES.

IT was the intention of the Spaniards to take the broken and shot-riddled hulk of the Revenge to Spain as their vaunted prize. And well might they set glory upon their conquest, for she was the one and only English ship that had surrendered to them during the whole course of the war, and in capturing her they had sacrificed four of their own best galleons, while sustaining great damage to some fourteen others. Nearly two thousand of their soldiers had been slain in the fight or drowned in the sea, including two high and mighty hidalgos, Don Louis de St. John, whom Grenville had vanquished with his own hand, and Don George de Prunaria de Malaga, besides many others of special account.

Their admiral now sent a large company of carpenters, riggers, and swabbers on board of her to repair her leaks, pump out the water that was deep in her hold, and clear her of the wreckage that encumbered her; while those who remained alive of her gallant crew were dispersed among the Spanish ships as prisoners, although permitted to go ashore upon the island during the daytime under close surveillance of a guard of armed soldiers.

Don Alonzo de Bassan's fleet lay in the roadstead of Terceira awaiting the daily expected arrival of the West India treasure-ships, which appeared in straggling numbers day by day. The Lord Thomas Howard's squadron, which had set out to lay capture to them, appeared not again, but having left the Revenge to her fate at the opening of the battle, departed for England. Some accused him of cowardice in avoiding an engagement; but 'tis certain enough that he knew the risks that were entailed, and if the truth must be set down, Sir Richard Grenville had really been guilty of disobedience.

While Gilbert and Timothy were still prisoners on board the St. Paul they were quartered in a little cabin under the poop. With them was Ambrose Pennington, and in another cabin were Roland Grenville and Captain Robinson. Jacob Hartop had remained on board the Revenge with Edward Webbe, refusing to quit her while she floated.

On a certain day, ere yet the combined fleets from Spain and the West Indies were ready to depart for Spain, Philip Oglander lay on his bed under pretence of being wounded, albeit his wounds were no more serious than a cut upon his knuckles and a dark-blue bruise upon the back of his right hand, where the pistol flung by Red Bob had struck him. It was not so much these hurts that kept him abed as the eager desire which was consuming him to hear what was going on in the cabin next to his own. It was the cabin occupied by his cousin Gilbert and Timothy Trollope. Philip did not dare to speak openly with his cousin and question him concerning what knowledge he might have of the things that had been going forward at Modbury Manor, but he was aware that Gilbert knew more than himself, for he had once seen Gilbert reading a letter—Drusilla's letter,—and also he had on occasion heard Timothy Trollope—whether in jest or in earnest—address Gilbert as "my lord".

Now Philip had himself received more than one letter from England. For his father, well knowing the traitorous business which occupied Philip in Spain, and knowing where a letter might find him, had written to him informing him of the death of Lord Champernoun, and bidding him remember that he, Philip, might one day inherit the title and estates, and that, therefore, it was incumbent upon him to look well to his personal safety.

"Indeed," wrote Jasper, "there is but one thing now standing between thee and this great heritage, and that is thy cousin, Master Gilbert Oglander. There is naught that I wish for more heartily than to hear of the young Jackanapes' death. Therefore I do conjure thee, my son, if thou shouldst by chance encounter him, prithee do thy work with more surety than thou didst do it in Beddington Dingle. Let there be no bungling, but bear thee well in mind that upon thy well-directed arrow shaft, or rapier point, must depend thy future and the possibility of dubbing thyself Baron Champernoun."

These were vague hints. But Philip had understood them. He had understood them to mean that his father urged him to seek out Gilbert Oglander and frustrate his return to England. And Philip had sought to obey these injunctions, although hitherto without success. He had tried to compass Gilbert's death during the battle, and, having failed, he yet had hope that some chance would favour him for fulfilling his cherished desire. And he furtively watched his cousin, spied upon his every movement, and endeavoured by every available means to entrap him to his death. But Gilbert, wheresoever he went about the galleon and whenever he went ashore, was for ever accompanied by Timothy Trollope, and Philip saw no advantage in running the risk of a hand-to-hand encounter with the barber's valiant son.

On this day as he lay in his cabin he listened for every word that should pass between Gilbert and his two companions. Much that was said was in the form of mere idle remark about the late battle, or about their wounds, or about the death of Sir Richard Grenville. But after a while there was talk of home, and at length, in answer to some question of Ambrose Pennington, Gilbert spoke of his uncle Jasper, and thereupon told the whole story of his grandfather's death and of his uncle's assumption of the title, even as Drusilla had recounted it in her letter.

"Ah!" muttered Philip, overhearing every word. "Then he doth know. By Our Lady, he doth know all!"

Then, setting his teeth together, he vowed that come what might Gilbert should never return to England to enjoy his inheritance. And from that moment he continued to watch his cousin with increased diligence. It was some comfort to his wicked soul to know that Gilbert was now a captive, and that as such it was more than probable he would spend many a year to come in some Spanish prison, as so many Englishmen had done before him. But this was not enough, for there was the chance of an escape from prison; there was the chance, indeed, that Don Alonzo might liberate his captives to ransom; there were a hundred ways by which Gilbert might succeed in returning to his native land. But there was one sure and certain means of preventing this, and that was that, by fair measures or by foul, Gilbert should be brought to his death, and Philip now resolved that this should be. He would not rest content until his cousin lay lifeless, ay, as lifeless as brave Sir Richard Grenville, whose body now lay at the bottom of the sea.

Gilbert was quite oblivious of the secret danger that threatened him, nor did he see aught but pure accident in what befell him on the next day.

The Spanish admiral did not wish that his ship should be encumbered by a crowd of wounded Englishmen. And on the day before the sailing of his fleet he ordered that those who were at present on board the St. Paul should be removed to the Revenge. And it followed accordingly that boats were put out for this purpose.

Gilbert and Timothy were at the gangway together, and it chanced that Timothy descended the side-ladder first, scarcely observing that Philip Oglander had crept to Gilbert's side. Timothy was already in the boat, when, on looking up, he saw Gilbert stumble and fall. Fortunately the boat was not close alongside; there was a yard of water between it and the ship. Gilbert was but a poor swimmer, and when he splashed into the sea he sank deep down. There was a strong current, and when he rose to the surface he appeared many yards away astern of the boat. Timothy plunged in and swam to him, thinking of sharks, and when he reached him and supported him, he turned to see if the boat were being brought to the rescue. He heard some orders given in Spanish, which seemed to him to be given in Philip Oglander's voice. Louder still than Philip's was the voice of Ambrose Pennington, which could be heard for a long distance away, crying out to the boatmen to cast off and pull towards the two lads, and mingling his commands with volleys of round English oaths that would surely have won for him the iron chain of punishment had they been heard a few days before on board the Revenge. But the Spaniards heeded him not at all, declaring that the boys were but foreign lumber who might well be allowed to drown for all the use they would be on the galleys.

Pennington appealed to Philip Oglander, saying that it was his own cousin and the head of his family who was in danger. But Philip turned away with a derisive laugh, no doubt congratulating himself upon the fact that it was his own foot over which Gilbert had tripped.

From a high part of the galleon's poop where he presently climbed he watched the heads of the two boys as they were carried away in the current. Soon an intervening galleon hid them from his view, and he consoled himself with the thought that he had very cleverly got rid of the one person who, next to his own father, stood between him and the baronage of Champernoun.

But he had not counted upon Timothy Trollope's powers of swimming. For some moments Timothy thought to strike out for the shore, and gripping Gilbert with his one arm and bidding him be calm, he manfully breasted the swelling waves. Swimming to the leeward of one of the galleons he presently saw an empty boat lying at her side. He swam towards it and got hold of its gunwale, helping Gilbert to do likewise. Then, while Gilbert held on, Timothy climbed over her stern, and kneeling upon one of the thwarts hauled his companion on board.

"'Twas Philip Oglander that did it," said he, wringing the water out of Gilbert's ragged clothing. "I saw him put forth his foot and trip thee. I have seen all along that he hath had designs against thee, Master Gilbert—I mean, my lord—"

"Nay, keep to the Gilbert, Tim," interrupted Gilbert. "As to this matter of my falling overboard, well, I can e'en believe as you say, nevertheless we might easily have been in a worse case than we are now. For, look you, there is a ladder up the ship's side at your elbow, and it were easy enough to get on board of her."

"It were equally easy to cut the boat's painter and make for the shore," said Tim.

"But there be no oars aboard," returned Gilbert.

"Wherefore need we concern ourselves about oars?" asked Timothy. "I will adventure it however it be." And he felt for his knife. A look of sudden despair came into his face. "Alas!" he added, "I had forgotten that the Dons had deprived us of our weapons!"

He stepped to the boat's bow, and was about to try to untie the knot of her painter when a voice greeted him from above, and a Spaniard with very furious curled moustachios appeared in the opening of the gangway. To escape now with the boat was impossible, and the two boys yielded themselves up as prisoners, explaining as best they could the accident that had brought them there.

The Spaniards appeared to regard the matter with indolent indifference, saying that the lads should be sent back on board the flag-ship on the morrow. In the meantime Gilbert and Timothy were permitted to sit in the warm sunlight to dry their clothes on the upper deck, and no more notice was taken of them until late in the evening, when one of the galleon's boys gave them each an onion. They slept under the lee of one of the big guns, and in the morning the same ship's-boy brought them a tin dish of bean soup, indicating by signs that they were to share it between them.

On the afternoon of that same day some officers from one of the other galleons came on board, and with them was one Maurice Fitz John, of Desmond, a forlorn-looking Irish traitor who, because he could speak English, had been sent to speak with the English prisoners in each ship and to persuade them to serve the King of Spain. He had not expected to find any on board this particular galleon—the Santa Maria, as she was named,—but discovering Gilbert and Timothy, he accosted them, believing them to be very humble seamen. He besought them to take arms in King Philip's legion, using very subtle arguments. They would have three times the amount of pay that they could get on an English ship, he said, and he promised them such advancement as he thought would tempt any young men who were, as these were, ship-broken and half-starved and ill-clothed, and if they would be good Catholics the safety of their souls should be assured.

Timothy Trollope noticed that the man was himself but ill-apparelled, and reflected that such beggarly appearance was in itself a sufficient answer to the argument of rich pay. As for the notion of changing their religion, it was as repulsive to both Tim and Gilbert as that of deserting their Queen.

"Well, well," said the Irishman, when, having used up all his eloquence in his pleadings, he turned to go, "an ye will not see the advantage of what is offered ye, 'tis no concern of mine. 'Tis yourselves that will suffer for your obstinacy. But I doubt not that a few years of work at the oars of His Majesty's galleys will bring ye to better reason." And with that he departed.

For many days thereafter Gilbert and Timothy led a very weary, uncomfortable life. In return for their food and such shelter as was given to them, they were made to do much dirty and distasteful work. They were never permitted to go on shore, yet they were free from the restraint of chains—a dispensation for which they were thankful. Gradually their wounds healed, and they regained strength with such speed, that when at last the full number of the treasure-ships had arrived and the fleet was ready to sail for Spain, they were almost as well in health as they had been on the day before the battle.

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CHAPTER XXII.

THE GREAT CYCLONE.

IT was on the last day of September that the combined fleets—to the number of a hundred and forty ships—weighed anchor and set sail. The sky was dark and threatening as they left Terceira, and they had not well got out of sight of the island when a most terrible storm arose. The sea was suddenly whipped up into great mountainous waves, the wind, which seemed to come from all quarters at once, howled and shrieked like a thousand furies. The vast fleet was dispersed, each galleon being left to take care of itself. Some tried to put back to Terceira, others endeavoured to make for the island of St. Michael's. The whole sea between these two islands was dotted over with struggling ships. It was such a storm as comes only once in a hundred years, and its effects were terrible. Out of the hundred and forty galleons no more than three-and-thirty ever arrived in Spain and Portugal. All the rest were cast upon the rocky ribs of the islands or were overwhelmed in the sea.

It was off the island of Terceira that the Revenge—or what remained of her—came to her end. She had been taken out in tow by the San Andrea galleon, but when the tempest rose to its height she was cast off and abandoned to her fate. Driven by the tremendous waves upon the outlying rocks, she was shattered to splinters, so that not a trace of her remained but a few balks of her stout oaken timbers that drifted as flotsam to the beach. There had been seventy men on board of her, many of them Spaniards, some few of them captive Englishmen. Among the latter were Jacob Hartop and Edward Webbe. Only one man reached the island alive, and he, being sorely hurt, had but time to tell his tale to the islanders and be shriven before he died.

Roland Grenville, who had been drafted on board the San Andrea, was the only one of our friends who was not shipwrecked. He was taken to Lisbon, where, after having endured great privations in prison (whereof much might be told), he fell in with the gallant Captain Monson, escaped to Cadiz, was again imprisoned, and finally rescued by the Earl of Essex on the occasion of the famous expedition against that Spanish stronghold.

For three days the Santa Maria was buffeted about in the storm. From her watery decks Gilbert Oglander and Timothy Trollope saw many a galleon go down, and not only such galleons as had been of Don Alonzo De Bassan's fleet, but many others of the treasure-ships, which took with them to the bottom their wealthy cargoes of silver and gold. On the morning of the fourth day, when the tempest was at its height, she fell in with the flag-ship, whose foremast was gone by the board, and whose sails were but so many ragged ribbons flying from her yards. Her rudder was gone, and she was helpless. Nor was the Santa Maria in any better case, for only her main-mast was standing, and the great waves washed over her, threatening to swamp her at every moment. The two ships came close together, and their white-faced and frightened seamen could see each other's faces from deck to deck. They drew apart when the deeper darkness of night came on, but in the morning they were again within sight, beating about in the perilous channel between the islands of St. George and Graciosa.

There was a slight lull in the storm in the afternoon, and the commander of the Santa Maria thought he might succeed in gaining some shelter under the lee of the island of Graciosa. He had his ship put about, and approaching the St. Paul attempted to cross her bows, but a sudden change in the wind drove him to leeward, and before anyone on board realized their peril the two vessels crashed together with fearful force. So great was the impact that Don Alonzo's galleon heeled over until her larboard bulwarks were for a moment under water. But she righted herself again and sailed on, leaving many of her men who had been upon her open decks floundering in the sea. Among these was Philip Oglander.

Philip was a good swimmer, and when he rose to the surface he struck out, shook the water from his dripping hair, and looked around. His own ship was now drawing away, forced onward by the storm. He turned and saw the high bows of the Santa Maria towering above him, with her timbers broken and wrecked, and the water pouring into the yawning gap. The galleon plunged forward, staggered, rolled, then plunged forward again with her bow buried deep in a sea of foam. She did not lift herself now, but first her forward part sank lower and lower, the waves swept over her, seeming to rejoice in their conquest, and presently, with a great gurgling sound, the vessel disappeared.

Gilbert and Timothy had been on her mid-deck when the two ships crashed together. They were standing abaft her thick main-mast, with their arms linked. Timothy, watching the ship's onward course and noting the position of the flag-ship, had foreseen the collision.

"Look you," said he, gripping Gilbert's arm more tightly, "we shall strike her. Be ready, master; and if we should founder, cling to me, I implore you." And then, even as he spoke, the two ships crashed together, and the lads were thrown off their feet. Timothy flung his arms around Gilbert and held him. They lay there waiting. They felt the deck trembling beneath them, swaying to and fro.

"We are sinking!" cried Timothy. And for many moments—moments that seemed like hours of suspense—he was silent. Suddenly there was a great breaking of timber. He saw the white foam leaping up over the steep incline of the deck. The tall main-mast swayed over and fell with a crash that was like a crack of thunder. And then all was dark, and he felt himself being drawn below in the vortex with the sinking ship.

Still clinging to his companion, he opened his eyes. The water was all black about him. He moved his legs, trying to force himself upward. Soon he began to rise; the darkness became less dense, it grew from black to dark green, and then to a lighter green, and at last the daylight burst once more upon him. Striking out with his one free arm he kept himself afloat, then disengaged himself from Gilbert and took a fresh hold of the lad, keeping his head up above the water. Gilbert's eyes greeted him with recognition.

"Hold on, hold on to me!" cried Timothy, as a great wave swept over them, carrying with it a huge spar of wreckage.

The spar threatened to fall down upon Gilbert's head, but the waves kept it buoyant. Timothy stretched forth his arm and gripped some floating cordage, and presently drew himself towards the drifting spar, which he found to be the galleon's main-mast.

"Lay hold on't!" he cried. And Gilbert, releasing his grip of Timothy's belt, put his hand upon the mast, and, with infinite trouble and after many failures, at last succeeded in climbing up and getting astride of it, while Timothy, working his way along to its end, also climbed up.

When they were both together again in comparative safety, they looked about them in the hope of saving some of the Spaniards.

"There is one!" cried Gilbert, as he saw a woolly black head appear within a couple of yards of him. "'Tis JosÉ, the blackamoor."

And Timothy stretched forth his leg for the negro, who speedily caught it and clambered up. A second and a third man appeared, but both were too far off to be helped, and as neither could swim they were quickly lost to sight.

It was at this juncture that Philip Oglander, swimming about in search of some wreckage by which he might hope to save himself, caught sight of the negro JosÉ. Timothy and Gilbert had their backs to him; he only saw that they were human figures, and that they were for the time being on a secure refuge. Swimming towards JosÉ, he at last attracted the negro's attention. The noise of the wind and waves was too great for a voice to be heard, and he climbed upon the floating mast without either Gilbert or Timothy's knowledge. It was, indeed, as much as any one of them could do to retain his balance and keep himself from being washed off, for the ponderous log upon which they rested rolled heavily upon the waves, and at times either plunged into them or was itself by them thrown upward into the air, and those who rode upon it might better have been upon a mad horse, so difficult was it to keep a seat. Cold and hungry and pale with the terror of their situation, the boys clung tightly with legs and arms, hoping only that God would bring them out of their peril.

The night came on and darkness deepened their distresses. Timothy, who was in front of Gilbert, had not thus far dared to turn round and face him, but he had worked his way backward so that Gilbert might cling to him, and the while the boy's hand touched him he was comforted. In the darkness of the night Gilbert heard what he thought was a human cry—as in truth it was,—and putting his lips to Timothy's ear he called out:

"He hath fallen off! JosÉ hath fallen off!"

But later he felt that someone was moving behind him, and again he spoke to Timothy.

"Nay, I mistook," said he; "he is still with us."

Timothy made no response, satisfied only that his companion was able to take even so much interest in anything apart from the thought of his own immediate danger.

The storm subsided somewhat during the early morning. The spar floated more easily, and when a faint streak of gray light appeared in the eastern sky, Timothy ventured to alter his position and bring himself round face to face with Gilbert. Glancing over Gilbert's shoulder, he saw that the negro—or what he supposed to be the figure of the negro—was still there, lying with his head upon his hands, and his hands gripping a strand of thick rope that was coiled about the mast. As the light grew stronger, however, he was astonished to notice that those hands were not black, and that where he had expected to see a head of woolly black hair there was a head whose hair was long and straight. Further scrutiny revealed to him the fact that through a long rent in their companion's jerkin there was a gleam of white skin. He waited until the coming daylight should enable him to discover more of this mystery, and as yet he said nothing to Gilbert.

At last the dawn broke, and with its coming Timothy saw the pale haggard face of Philip Oglander turned towards him, with the dark hollow eyes gleaming in startled recognition.

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CHAPTER XXIII.

THE WRITING IN THE BOOK.

GILBERT saw the sudden change that had come into Timothy's countenance, but he paid little heed to it, for his own attention had been attracted by something else, something that the light of dawn had disclosed upon the sea not a cable's length away from where he and his two companions were floating about on that log of the lost galleon's mast.

Gripping Timothy's shoulders with his two hands, he cried aloud:

"Look you, Tim! Look! A ship!"

And at that instant Philip Oglander's eyes rested also upon the object which had attracted Gilbert.

Timothy craned his head round, and saw the ship's huge bulk heaving lazily upon the sea, with a glint of light upon a piece of brass that edged her forecastle rail. Her bow was towards them. Her masts were all gone, and there was no sign of life upon her decks. As she rose lazily upon the waves the lower planks of her hull were seen to be thickly encrusted with barnacles.

But Timothy was for the time being very little concerned with the ship. There was now a hope of safety, and with that hope he was satisfied. But his discovery that Philip Oglander was now a companion of their strange position filled him with a feeling of dismay, for he knew that Philip was no friend to Gilbert any more than to himself, and there was something about the lad that made him uncomfortable, while yet there was of course no reason to fear him. Touching Gilbert on the shoulder Tim signed to him to turn his head. Gilbert obeyed, and saw his cousin, and wondered how it had come to pass that he was here. His wonderment continued throughout the whole morning, for it was still impossible to carry on any conversation, on account not only of the noise of the storm, but also of the danger of moving and of being thrown off the spar into the sea.

At mid-day the wind fell and the sun came out. They were no nearer to the ship than they had been in the early morning. All through the afternoon the lads watched the labouring hulk, but even when the sun had set they could not be sure whether the distance between her and themselves had increased or diminished. That next night seemed to be a full year's time of endurance and cold and hunger, and their only comfort was in the consciousness that the waves were gradually becoming less in size and that the wind's force had abated.

On the next morning it was seen that the ship was a little nearer; she was indeed so close that every detail of her structure could be distinguished. She was still bow on, as the mariners say, and her towering after-castle could be seen high above the level of her forward bulwarks. Something about her—the tangle of green and brown sea-weed clinging to her bulging bows, the thick crust of barnacles below her water-line, and a white mess of guano along the edge of her bulwarks and about the lips of her chase-guns—seemed to indicate that she had been drifting for a long time unattended. It was clear that she had been deserted. It was equally clear that she had not formed one of either Don Alonzo's fleet from Spain or of the fleet of treasure-ships from the West Indies.

"Dost think we might get some food in her, Tim, if so be we could win our way aboard?" asked Gilbert.

Timothy shook his head.

"Haply we might," said he gravely; "but haply we might not. Yet even to be upon her decks would be some comfort; for at the least we might then stretch our legs and run about until some warmth came into us."

Philip Oglander drew himself close behind Gilbert, and leaning over him called out to Timothy Trollope:

"Canst swim, Master Trollope?" he questioned.

Timothy nodded. "Why?" he asked.

"Because," returned Philip, "there is some rope here, which one might bind about one's body, and so, swimming to the ship, haul this mast alongside."

"I have already bethought me of that," said Timothy; "but the rope is not long enough. A better plan were for you and me to lay ourselves in the water at the mast's side, and so, clinging to it, paddle with our feet until we bring it near. Then, when we be close enough, I would indeed swim with the rope."

This suggestion was agreed upon, and Timothy and Philip put themselves one at either side of the mast and propelled it along; not very quickly, it is true, for with all their efforts it was but small way that they could get into the heavy log. Yet if it was only inch by inch that they moved it, this was something. They laboured all through the morning, and at mid-day they had the satisfaction of knowing that they had lessened the distance between them and the ship by at least half a dozen yards. Meanwhile Gilbert gathered all the pieces of rope that were wound about the mast and spliced them together; and when this was done his two companions converted it into a hawser, and binding an end of it about their bodies swam towards the ship, towing the mast behind them. Thus they made better progress, and in the evening, while the sun was setting in a rack of clouds, they had brought themselves under the vessel's larboard bow.

Gilbert Oglander, waiting until a wave should lift him within reach, caught at a line of rope that hung from the ship's broken bowsprit. By this he swarmed up. Timothy and Philip followed, and at last, after great difficulty, all three of them stood upon her deck.

It was covered with the refuse of sea-birds. The deck guns were white with guano. Looking aft to the incline of her poop-deck they saw the companion hatch of the cabin, and this suggested that in the cabin itself they might find something that would serve as food. Timothy led the way down to the main-deck. In a coil of rope on one of the closed hatchways he caught sight of two white eggs. He leapt to them, and took one of them in his hand, giving it to Gilbert; the other he gave to Philip.

"God grant that they be fresh," said he.

Philip tapped his egg on one of the stanchions, chipping off a little piece of the shell. With a muttered Spanish curse he dropped the egg upon the deck, and stamped his foot upon the shrivelled, half-formed little sea-gull that the shell had enclosed.

Gilbert bent down to break the other egg on a corner of the hatch covering. As he did so he caught sight of something that glittered on the deck—a small square of yellow metal about the size of his hand. He picked it up and examined it.

"Why, 'tis gold!" said he.

"Ay," agreed Timothy, "and there be other pieces the same as it. Look!" he added, pointing to the scuppers. And there Gilbert saw at least a dozen other little bars of gold.

Philip saw them also, and darted towards them, gathering them together with miserly avarice.

"Come," said Timothy, "let us go below and seek for food. I fear me there is little hope of our finding any, but it may be that we can come upon a few grains of corn or else a crust of old bread."

He led the way aft to a door under the quarter-deck, and pushed it open. A dry, mouldy smell met him as he entered into the darkness. He felt about with his hands, and stepped cautiously until he found himself at the head of a narrow staircase. Step by step he went down. The stairs creaked under him.

"'Tis all well," he said, looking back at Gilbert, who had hesitated to follow. "There is another door here, if I could but find the handle. Ah, 'tis here!"

He turned the handle, and a ray of light fell upon him. Gilbert was soon at his heels, and they entered together into a spacious cabin, which, in spite of its dank and mouldy atmosphere, bore still some signs of past luxury. At its farther end was a row of square port-holes, at each of which there was a small brass cannon, richly chased and ornamented. The panels around the cabin were of finely carved oak, with figures of saints and quaint devices and Latin legends. There were curtains of crimson velvet, and in the corners were little shelves of carved oak upon which stood goblets of silver and gold. Facing the port-holes there was a large mirror, black now, and dulled by the damp atmosphere. Around the sides stood large oak chests, which seemed to have served as seats; and in the middle of the floor, which was covered with the remains of what had once been a handsome Turkey carpet, there was a large oak table.

It was this table upon which Timothy Trollope's eyes first rested as he entered. It was strewn with jars and candlesticks, cups and dishes, all of them made of solid gold, and in their midst, scattered about like corn on a barn floor, were hundreds of many-coloured precious stones that sparkled in the light.

"Food! food!" cried Timothy, casting his hungry eyes about him.

"Haply there will be some in here," said Gilbert; and he strode towards one of the chests whose lid was partly open. He looked within. "Alas!" he cried, "it is only gold!"

Timothy passed to one of the others. It was locked. He passed to the next and opened it. "No," said he, "'tis only money!" At the farther end of the cabin one of the chests had fallen asunder like a rotten sack of grain, and the floor was strewn with gold coins.

"Here is a cupboard," cried Gilbert, turning the rusty key which was still in the lock. But the shelves were filled with daggers, their hafts studded with gems, and with pistols of many design.

Under the table a square of the carpet was turned back, revealing a trap-door. Gilbert caught hold of the ring-bolt and pulled it up and looked down into the darkness. As the ship rolled, he thought he heard the rushing of water. Taking up a handful of doubloons, he dropped them through the opening. They splashed into water.

"Prithee, where is Philip?" asked Timothy. "Wherefore hath he not come with us?"

"I left him on the deck," answered Gilbert.

"Then I pray you let us return to him," said Timothy, "for I have found some four tallow candles, and we must share them with him. They are but a sorry sort of food to feed upon withal, but I have oft times heard of hungry men staving off starvation with no better fare. Nay, I am in earnest," he added, seeing the look of disgust in Gilbert's face. "Sure they are made out of good tallow-fat." He smiled grimly as he offered one of the candles to Gilbert, saying with much gravity, "I pray you, good my lord, wilt join me in a banquet of candles?"

Gilbert took the proffered food, yet hesitated to begin.

They quitted the cabin and mounted the stairs. When they regained the deck Philip Oglander was not to be seen. They called him, but he did not answer. Already the dusk was falling and they became anxious. But Timothy felt well assured that Philip was still on board, and surmised that he had found his way below into some one of the cabins. Nevertheless a further search was made for him, and it was only the growing darkness that urged them once more to return to what they believed to be the captain's room. Here Timothy made a beginning upon one of the candles, and, finding it not altogether disagreeable, he recommended Gilbert to make a similar meal. So hungry were they both that they would fain have finished the whole of their store, but they remembered Philip, and in fairness they put aside for him his due share.

It was, as Timothy had remarked, a sorry sort of food, but in the absence of any better it served for the time, and having partaken of it they cleared the table of the things that were upon it, stretched themselves out upon its hard substance, and, committing themselves to God's keeping, fell asleep. A gnawing thirst disturbed their slumbers, but the rest was welcome after all their troubles and dangers, and when a beam of morning sunlight pouring in through the stern-ports awakened them they arose, conscious that they had been refreshed.

Timothy's first act was to go to one of the open port-holes to look at the weather. The sea was now much calmer than when he had last looked upon it, and instead of the great broken waves with their caps of foam and showery spray, there was a long, regular rolling swell, only slightly rippled by the fresh morning breeze. That breeze was so refreshing that Timothy lingered at the port-hole, breathing it with joy. He crept outward, too, and tried to make out some of the devices that were carved upon the vessel's stern. Suddenly he hastened back into the cabin. His face was ghastly, and a strange agitation shone in his eyes.

"Master Gilbert!" he cried, "Master Gilbert—my lord, my lord!"

Gilbert stared at him in amazement, thinking for the moment that he had lost his senses.

"What hath come over thee, Timothy?" he asked. "Hast seen a ghost?"

"Haply I have," answered Timothy, his limbs shaking under him. "Dost know what ship we are in?"

"Nay, how should I know?" returned Gilbert, still in doubt as to Timothy's sanity.

Timothy grasped Gilbert by his two shoulders and said in a hollow, awe-stricken voice:

"'Tis The Golden Galleon!"

Gilbert started back in astonishment.

"How know you?" he cried.

"By the devices I have now seen carven upon her stern," said Timothy. "I knew them again. They are the same that we saw in the midst of that weird green light on the Sargasso Sea, and 'tis the self-same ship, as I'm a living son of a barber. 'Tis Jacob Hartop's Golden Galleon—or else her ghost, as Jacob averred."

"Her ghost!" echoed Gilbert; and he put his hand upon the table as if to assure himself that it was a solid substance. "Nay, Tim, 'tis no ghost," said he, "although I will not deny that she may be Jacob's galleon." He paused for many moments reflecting. At last he went on: "Prithee, Tim, didst ever hear from Jacob how long it was since he deserted that same golden galleon of his?"

"Three years at the least," answered Timothy; "for 'tis not to be forgotten that when he had left her he voyaged yet again to the Spanish Main, where he fell in with your uncle Jasper and the good ship Pearl."

Now, in preparing the table as a bed on the night before, Timothy had left only one thing lying there, and that thing was a large book which he had placed as a pillow for Gilbert. The book lay still upon the table close to Gilbert's hand. Gilbert idly turned back its first page. His eyes rested upon a line of cramped and almost illegible writing. He looked at it closer and then started back.

"Tim!" he cried. "'Tis true—'tis true what you say, for here is his very name writ in this book!" He put his finger on the page while Timothy drew nearer. "There, where I point," he added. "'Tis his own hand, see—'Jacob Hartop, Buccaneer, Hys logg booke'."

"Nay, I must e'en take thy word for't, my master," said Tim; "for thou knowest that although I can make shift to read a line of print, yet writing done with a quill is beyond me. So," he mused, "this is poor Jacob's treasure-ship—the same that he hath so oft spoken of. Ay, and I'll engage 'tis, as he hath reported, loaded full deep with gold. Such wealth might make us great and glorious did we but have it in England, Master Gilbert. But of what avail is it now? 'Tis of no use under the sun. For my own part, I'd exchange it all for a barrel of good Devon apples or a loaf of my mother's home-made bread."

"And I also," added Gilbert.

They were silent for some minutes. Timothy was the first to speak.

"'Tis passing strange where thy cousin Philip hath got to," said he. "Methinks 'twere well that we now made another search for him."

Gilbert agreed, and together they went and searched the ship. During their search they discovered that the galleon was indeed laden with gold. But they cared not for this while their vitals were being gnawed with hunger and their lips were blue and parched with thirst.

Philip Oglander, it would seem, was more familiar with the structure of a galleon than were either Timothy or Gilbert. For instead of going at once to the poop-cabins he had found his way down to the rooms amidships, where it was customary to keep the stores. What little food he had found was either saturated with salt-water or rotten with decay, or else so hard and dried up that it would have required a pickaxe to break it, much less human teeth. In his quest, however, he had discovered what Gilbert and Timothy had not even dreamt of, namely, some huge bins of Spanish wine. Into one of these he had managed to bore a hole with the point of his dagger. Unlike Timothy, he had not for an instant thought of sharing his discovery. He had taken his fill of the wine, leaving a stream running from the bin, and finding some stale and mildewed bread, he had cleaned it and put it to soak and soften in a bath of the red liquid.

When Timothy and Gilbert at last came upon him he was lying on the floor in an intoxicated sleep, with a flood of wine about him. Timothy regarded him in horror and disgust.

"It seemeth to me that Master Philip might almost have acquainted us of such a discovery as this," said he, and picking up a little golden cup from the floor he held it to catch the drippings from the bin. He presently passed the cup to Gilbert.

"Drink, my master," said he; "'twill do thee good. But take not much at the first, for there is naught so bad upon an empty stomach as strong liquor. Thy cousin hath seemingly been so unwise as to drink his fill."

"'Tis naught to marvel at," said Gilbert, having taken a mouthful, "for of a surety it doth put new life into one. Ay, even to wet one's lips with it doth send the blood racing through the body like the water in a mill-dam."

Timothy espied Philip's bread soaking in its silver dish of wine, and he took some out, sharing it with Gilbert, and they ate it and were refreshed.

Suddenly as they were leaving Philip to finish his sleep, they were startled by hearing from across the sea the report of a cannon-shot. Timothy bounded forward, and was speedily upon the deck. Gilbert followed at his heels. Looking over to the eastward they saw a gallant little ship in full sail bearing down towards them. A faint mist of smoke was being wafted by the wind from one of her forward guns. From her sprit-topmast there waved the glorious flag of St. George.

"'Tis an English ship!" cried Timothy with joy.

"Ay," added Gilbert; "and what is more, 'tis one that is no stranger to me. Thou shouldst know her even better than I, Tim; for, if I mistake not, 'tis none other than Jacob Whiddon's Pilgrim. I know her by the token that her fore-topsail hath got a round patch of lighter canvas in it. And, mark you, 'tis Master Whiddon's ancient that flieth from her mainyard. Ay, 'tis the Pilgrim. And of that I have now no manner of doubt."

"Then are we saved!" murmured Timothy. "Prithee, Master Gilbert, hie thee below and bid thy cousin Philip come up, while that I climb to the top of the poop-deck and make a signal."

And so saying Timothy sought about for some flag or rag which he might wave to the ship as a sign that there were people on board the galleon. No flag could he find, but taking a strip of red silk that he had discovered in Hartop's cabin, he tied it by the corners to the end of a pike, and this he waved to and fro from the highest part of the galleon's hull. His signal was answered from the Pilgrim, and the ship bore down before the wind with a belt of white foam streaming off from her round bows, and her white sails glimmering in the bright sunlight.

Meanwhile Gilbert Oglander had gone below to arouse his cousin. Philip was very sound asleep; but after many efforts Gilbert awakened him, and he staggered to his feet. Glaring at Gilbert with bloodshot eyes he did not speak for many minutes. Gilbert told him of the approaching ship, and added that now they might hope to be taken home to England.

This mention of England seemed to have aroused strange thoughts in Philip's brain, and without warning he closed the cabin door and planted himself with his back against it.

"Thou, at least, shalt never see England again!" he cried. "By the Holy Mother thou shalt not! Dost think that I will brook the thought of thee being Baron Champernoun, while I, who am a better man than thee, am plain Philip Oglander? No! This ship hath wealth enough aboard her to serve me in plenty for the rest of my days. And thou shalt not share it; neither shalt thou ever live to hear thyself addressed by the great title of Champernoun!"

He spoke the words in a thick drunken voice, his eyes fixing themselves upon his cousin in terrible menace.

Gilbert could not repress the smile that came to his lips.

"Hush, good my cousin!" said he. "Thou hast taken overmuch of this strong wine, methinks, and thy tongue doth say things which thy heart cannot mean."

"HE MADE A LUNGE AT GILBERT, AIMING A BLOW AT HIS HEART."

"What?" cried Philip. And whipping his dagger from his belt he made a lunge at Gilbert, aiming a blow at his heart.

Gilbert drew aside and avoided the blow, and Philip's head struck with a resounding knock against the bulkhead. The pain enraged him, and swearing a great Spanish oath he renewed the attack, rushing at his cousin with wild fury. This time his foot slipped on the slimy, wine-flooded floor. He fell with a heavy thud; his weapon hand was under him, and the dagger, which he had held sword-wise, with the point upward, buried the full length of its blade in his chest.

Gilbert turned to the door and opened it. As he looked round at Philip he saw a stream of blood issuing from under him. Philip tried to rise, but rolled over on his back. Only the handle of his dagger could be seen. Gilbert bent down to withdraw it, but it was tightly wedged between the ribs.

"The Saints protect me!" groaned Philip. "I am done for!"

"Much do I fear that thou art indeed. God forgive thee," said Gilbert, and quitting the store-room he returned to the deck to summon Timothy. It was at this moment that Timothy had seen the answering signal from the Pilgrim. He went below with Gilbert and when they entered the store-room they found that Philip Oglander was dead.

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CHAPTER XXIV.

PETER TROLLOPE SHUTS UP SHOP.

ON a certain gray, windy morning in late October, Peter Trollope's shop was more than usually busy. Every bench had its occupant, and the talk was loud and animated. In the big chair near the fire sat that great courtier Sir Walter Raleigh, smoking a stick of twisted tobacco, to which he gave the Spanish name of cigarro. He joined not much in the gossip, for he had already recounted all that was so far known concerning the last fight of the Revenge, news of which had come to England some few days earlier, and he was passing doleful in spirit over the death of his noble kinsman, Sir Richard Grenville. Now and again he did indeed put in a word when it was question of deciding the number of Spanish galleons that had been vanquished in the fight, or the number of Spaniards that had been slain, but for the most part he was gloomily silent.

"My brother Tom was aboard of her, and I'll engage that he gave not up his life ere he had laid a good dozen of the Dons low," said a burly fisherman from one of the corners of the shop.

"Ay," added another man, "and my son Bill was among 'em; likewise my good wife's brother Dick."

Peter Trollope snipped his scissors over the head of the young gallant whose hair he was trimming.

"My boy Timothy went also out with the fleet," said he; "though 'twas not on one of Her Majesty's ships that he sailed, but aboard Jacob Whiddon's Pilgrim, of which there hath been no word."

"She was seen taking some part in the battle," remarked Sir Walter Raleigh, puffing a cloud of blue smoke in a column above his head, "for since Whiddon was but an adventurer and owed no duty of obedience to my Lord Thomas, he was free to do what he listed. And he listed to have a shot at the galleons, and so, for aught I know, came to grief."

"Ah!" sighed the barber. "Then peradventure Timothy hath, after all, been slain?"

"As like as not," nodded Sir Walter; "as like as not. And you may take it that since naught hath been heard of the Pilgrim, she hath either gone to the bottom in the battle, or else been broken on the rocks of the Western Isles, as so many others were in the great storm that followed on the heels of the fight."

"The rascal was full eager to join the Revenge," continued the barber, "and did declare most positively to me that Sir Richard had promised him a berth. 'Twas his desire to be with his young master, Master Gilbert Oglander, that took him away—"

"Touching Master Gilbert Oglander," broke in Christopher Pym, addressing Sir Walter Raleigh, "he was on board the Revenge. I pray you, Sir Walter, I pray you, tell me is there aught of news concerning the lad?"

Sir Walter shook his head.

"No," he answered. "Much do I fear me that he hath gone with the rest. And 'tis a pity if it be so, for now that the vile traitor, his uncle, hath paid the penalty of his treachery—"

"The penalty!" interrupted Christopher Pym. "Hath he then been proven guilty?"

"Ay," returned Raleigh. And at this the whole room was silent, for the information was new. Sir Walter Raleigh, resting his elbows on the arms of his chair, held his two hands in front of him, busying his be-ringed fingers with adjusting the outer leaf of tobacco about his cigar. "Ay," he went on, "Jasper hath paid the penalty, for being found guilty by the judgment of the Star Chamber, he was on Monday morning last beheaded on Tower Hill."

Sir Walter paused, and having adjusted his cigar to his satisfaction he took up the fire-tongs, and with them picked out a piece of burning wood from the fire the while he lighted the end of his cigar.

"You may be sure," he went on, "that 'twas not as Lord Champernoun that the rascal was tried. For apart from the fact that he had not yet proved that his nephew, Master Gilbert Oglander, was dead, and that therefore he was himself by right of succession the real Lord Champernoun—apart from this, I say, he had neither taken out his license as a baron nor taken his seat in Her Majesty's House of Peers. He had been over eager to claim his dead father's name and estates, you see, my masters, and by very reason of his too great eagerness he revealed his trickery and the vile treachery that lay behind it."

"Ay, but his treachery and his machinations and intrigues with the King of Spain would yet have been discovered," said Peter Trollope, "even although he had not sought to make himself Baron Champernoun. For it hath been amply proven that even before my Lord Thomas Howard's fleet departed out of Plymouth, Jasper Oglander had connived at the escape of the Spanish prisoners of war—had even planned their escape, indeed,—and had sent off his son Philip to Spain to inform the Spanish king of the purpose of my Lord Thomas's expedition against the plate fleet."

"All that and more than that was brought out at the man's trial in London," said Sir Walter Raleigh. "And now it seemeth that that same son of his, Philip Oglander, was present on board Don Alonzo Bassan's galleon."

"'Twere well, methinks, that the lad had accompanied his father to Tower Hill," remarked Peter Trollope. "And now," he added, "a strange thought hath occurred to me. It is that, should Master Gilbert—or Lord Champernoun as he should truly be named—have been slain in the fight on the Revenge, and should his cousin have escaped, then the cur Philip Oglander must now be regarded as the head of the Oglander family, and the rightful owner of the title and estates."

No one seemed to take notice of this remark, but at last Christopher Pym spoke.

"Better that the title and estates should fall into oblivion than that," said he. "Howsoever it be," he added, rising and taking up his walking-staff, "I am now impelled to take horse and journey to Willoughby Grange, there to inform my Lady Betty Oglander of this news, and bid her return to her rightful home at Modbury."

"I pray you give her ladyship my most devoted remembrances," said Raleigh; "and bid her from me to be of good cheer concerning her son Gilbert, for if the lad be no more, he hath at least given up his life for the honour of his Queen and country, even as his sire and so many other of his noble family hath done before him. Give you good-day, Master Pym, and God speed you."

An hour or so after this conversation had ended, Peter Trollope sat alone in his shop thinking sadly over the remark that had fallen from Sir Walter Raleigh touching the probable fate of the Pilgrim. Trade had not been brisk at the "Pestle and Mortar" during the months of Timothy's absence. Of hair cutting and the trimming of beards there had been plenty, but it chanced that a very skilful man of medicine had opened a business a few doors away, and had succeeded so well that he had drawn all Master Trollope's surgical trade away from him, so that, but for an occasional customer who came in to have a tooth drawn, Peter could scarcely with justice call himself a barber-surgeon, but merely a barber. Also, he had fallen into debt, and his creditors were pressing him for a settlement. Upon all his other distresses had come the word that in all probability his son Timothy had been either killed in battle or drowned in a storm; and this was the destruction of all his hopes, for he had in his more sanguine moments nursed the thought that Tim, even though he returned penniless and ragged, might yet be a help to him at this present time, and a joy to him in the future. But if Tim were really dead, what more could be looked to in this world but continued poverty and hard work and unhappiness?

In the midst of his doleful sorrowings and regrets he heard the clatter of horse's feet on the stones of the street outside. The door of the shop was swung open, and in bounced Timothy himself.

His face was rosy brown and it wore a joyous smile, and although his clothing was woefully ragged and white with the salt of the sea, yet there was an air of dignity about him that was quite foreign to the lad who had gone away seven months earlier. He strode into the shop as though he had been one of the lords of the land, and stood in front of his father with his arms akimbo, looking down upon the amazed barber and laughing at his confusion.

"Father," said Timothy, "I am come back."

"In sooth," said the barber, "my eyes give me ample evidence of the fact."

"And art glad to see me, father?"

"Ay, God knoweth I am that, Tim. Give me thy hand!"

"What, though I am dressed as a beggar withal?"

"Ay, though thy rags were e'en raggeder than they are," said Peter, the tears filling his eyes. He shook the lad's hand with a grip whose strength betokened his fulness of joy. "Tim, my lad," he added after a brief pause, "tell me, I pray you, hast thou been in battle?"

"Ay," returned Timothy, "the most glorious battle that ever was. I have fought, father, as my wounds shall presently prove to thee, and have killed as many Spaniards as might fill thy poor shop."

"An thou hast proved thyself a man and not a coward?"

Timothy nodded.

"'Tis enough for me," said Peter. "And now, I pray you, tell me where is thy ship?"

"Lying in Polperro Bay," answered Timothy, "where we dropped anchor but a half-dozen hours since. Master Whiddon and my Lord Champernoun—Master Gilbert Oglander that was—have come with me into Plymouth, and bade me beseech thee to come with me to the sign of the Crown, where they now are, and where we are presently to sit down to the lordliest banquet mine host can provide. So get thee ready instanter, while that I go within to see my mother and don some goodlier raiment."

"Nay, but I cannot leave my business at this hour of the day," objected Peter.

At which Timothy laughed and said:

"Hark ye, father, and listen to me. Thou hast cropped thy last head of hair and shaven thy last chin. No more work shalt thou do for the rest of thy days. Thou shalt have a coach to drive in, and a lordly mansion to live in, with a tribe of serving people to do thy bidding, and shalt live on the best in the land—"

"Nay, mock me not, boy," cried the barber. "I can ill bear thy jests just now; for of a truth I am deep in debt, and know not how we shall contrive to live without charity beyond another week."

"A truce to your charity," cried Tim. "Hark'ee, father, I am rich. Ay, rich as a king." He plunged his hands into his pockets and scattered many golden coins upon the chair near which he stood. "These be but a few trifles that have slipped into my pockets unawares, and are but a small sample of the Pilgrim's cargo. If more be needed for the nonce, thou hast but to send a cart round to Polperro and get more. But bear this in mind, good my father, thou shalt shut up shop for good and all, and never again shall thine ears be assailed by the snipping of barber's scissors or the fizzling of curling-tongs!"

Now this that Timothy promised did actually come to pass. Nor was Peter Trollope the only one in Plymouth who enjoyed some benefit from the treasures of The Golden Galleon. Every man and boy of the ship's company of the Pilgrim received his proportionate share of the wealth, while Captain Whiddon—without whom Timothy and Gilbert might never have returned to England—received only less than Gilbert and Timothy.

The Pilgrim had not been large enough to hold all the treasure that The Golden Galleon had contained, not even although her very ballast had been jettisoned to make more room. But when she had been loaded with as much as she could safely carry, she had been brought home as quickly as the winds would drive her. What became of the old derelict, whether she sank to the bottom as a consequence of the shots that were fired into her hull by the departing Pilgrim, or whether she remained afloat long enough for yet another ship to board her and take toll of her remaining treasure, Gilbert Oglander and his companions never learned. But, judging by circumstances, it is pretty certain that she sank to the bottom, and that, as Jacob Hartop had expressed it, her treasures went down to the mermaid's halls, where her precious gems might serve to bedeck the mermaid's necks.

It was on the third day after the return of the Pilgrim that Gilbert Oglander—or, as we may now call him, Lord Champernoun—rode along the familiar lanes to Modbury. He had thus delayed his home-coming because he had heard that his mother and Drusilla were still absent. But on this morning Christopher Pym had come to him and told him that they had returned, and were expecting him.

Timothy rode in his company, not now as his squire but as his companion, for it was as companions and loving friends that they were always afterwards to regard each other.

Gilbert waxed indignant when he saw the work that his uncle had done in hewing down the trees in the avenue of the manor, but his indignation was soon overcome by the joy of meeting his mother and Drusilla.

To tell of that meeting, and to record all that was said and done on that momentous day would make a long story in itself. In the evening Gilbert sat at the head of the table with his dearest friends and all his household about him. It was a happy occasion, not only for himself who had endured so much, but also for his mother and for Drusilla, who now realized for the first time that the terrors held over them by Jasper Oglander were no more to be feared, and whose anxiety concerning Gilbert was at last allayed by seeing him there alive and well, occupying his rightful place, and bearing within himself the promise of a great and useful manhood.

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"English boys owe a debt of gratitude to Mr. Henty."—AthenÆum.